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GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 

Columbia  University,  New  York 
Sales  Agents 

HUMPHREY  MILFORD 

Amen  Corner,  E.  C.,  London 

EDWARD  EVANS  AND  SONS,  Ltd. 

30  North  Szechuen  Road,  Shanghai 


Fig.  i.  View  of  the  Acropolis  from 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


A  PORTRAYAL  OF  GREEK  CIVILIZATION 


l  BY 

LA  RUeVaN  HOOK,  Ph.D. 

PROFESSOR  OF  GREEK  AND  LATIN  IN  BARNARD  COLLEGE 
COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY 


J12rto  Sotft 

COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 

1923 

All  rights  reserved 


COPYRIGHT,  IQ23 

by  Columbia  University  Press 

Set  up  and  electrotyped.  Published  September,  1923 


PRINTED  BY 
THE  PLIMPTON  PRESS 
NORWOOD'MASS'U'S'A 


“The  greatest  single  gift  in  Education  is  to  infect  the  average  man  with 
the  spirit  of  the  Humanities.”  —  Sir  William  Osler. 

“We  should  have  scant  capital  to  trade  on  were  we  to  throw  away  the  wis¬ 
dom  we  have  inherited  and  seek  our  fortunes  with  the  slender  stock  we  our¬ 
selves  have  accumulated.”  —  Woodrow  Wilson. 

“Nothing  makes  a  man  more  interesting  to  himself  or  to  others  than  that 
wide  knowledge  of  men  and  life ,  that  wide  knowledge  of  the  globe  and  of 
man’s  past  and  present  on  the  globe ,  which  is  given  by  a  liberal  or  cultural 
education  in  which  the  study  of  classical  literature  is  an  essential  element.” 
—  Theodore  Roosevelt. 

“A  fine  grasp  upon  the  meaning  of  Greek  and  Roman  thought  and  insti¬ 
tutional  life  gives  new  significance  to  one’s  knowledge  of  natural  science ,  a 
deeper  meaning  to  one’s  participation  in  political  organization  and  ac¬ 
tivity  and  a  sure  standard  for  the  determination  and  appreciation  of  excel¬ 
lence  in  letters  and  in  art’’  —  Nicholas  Murray  Butler. 


PREFACE 


MODERN  conditions  have  caused  a  great  de¬ 
crease  in  the  number  of  those  who  study 
Greek  at  first-hand.  It  is,  however,  coming 
to  be  more  and  more  realized  that  an  education  which 
aims  at  being  truly  liberal  and  yet  ignores  or  neglects 
the  source  of  that  which  is  culturally  best  in  modern 
civilization  is  inadequate.  In  consequence,  many  col¬ 
leges  are  prescribing,  or  strongly  recommending  to  all 
students  courses  of  study  in  Classical  Civilization. 
Ever  increasing  interest,  too,  in  ancient  Greece,  which 
has  bequeathed  to  the  modern  world  a  priceless  her¬ 
itage,  is  being  shown  by  intelligent  readers  in  general, 
and  in  the  last  ten  or  fifteen  years  many  books  devoted 
to  one  or  another  aspect  of  Hellenic  civilization  have 
appeared  and  have  received  a  warm  welcome.  All  the 
modern  western  nations  have  affection  and  veneration 
for  ancient  Greece.  Amid  all  their  strife  and  rivalries, 
the  peoples  of  Europe  and  America  have  this  common 
interest,  devotion,  and  bond  —  all  admire  and  cherish 
the  Greek  elements  in  modern  culture. 

Numerous  indeed  are  the  books  that  deal  with  some 
aspect  or  other  of  ancient  Greek  life  and  thought  and 
seek  to  interpret  the  Greek  genius  and  achievements. 
Is  there  need,  then,  of  another?  I  think  there  is.  None 
of  the  existing  books  suits  the  needs  of  the  reader  I 
have  in  mind.  The  available  treatises  in  English  are 
either  too  comprehensive  in  treatment  or  too  limited 
in  scope  and  purpose.  Some  are  too  brief  and  super¬ 
ficial,  others  are  too  technical.  There  are  excellent 
volumes  devoted  to  Greek  History  (e.  g.,  Botsford, 
Bury),  to  Greek  Art  and  Archaeology  (Fowler  and 
Wheeler),  to  the  Theater  and  Drama  (Norwood),  to 
Private  and  Public  Life  (Gulick),  to  Education  (K.  G. 
Freeman),  to  Religious  Thought  (C.  H.  Moore),  to 
Economics  (Zimmern),  and  to  the  Greek  Genius  and 


Vll 


Vlll 


PREFACE 


the  Legacy  of  Greece  (Livingstone).  But  these  books 
are  largely  of  restricted  subject.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  lexicons,  the  handbooks,  and  the  Manuals  of  Class¬ 
ical  Antiquities  (e.g.,  the  admirable  Companion  to 
Greek  Studies ,  edited  by  Whibley)  cover  too  wide 
a  field  and  are  too  detailed  and  encyclopaedic;  they 
are  works  for  consultation  rather  than  perusal  and  fre¬ 
quently  assume  some  knowledge  of  the  Greek  language 
and  civilization. 

It  is  obvious  that  no  one  book,  and  especially  one  of 
brief  compass,  can  adequately  present  or  interpret  an¬ 
cient  Greek  civilization  in  its  entirety.  No  such  pre¬ 
sumptuous  illusion  is  entertained  by  the  writer  of  this 
volume.  My  aim  is  this:  To  present  to  the  reader, 
who  may  or  may  not  have  some  previous  knowledge  of 
the  Greek  language  or  civilization,  certain  aspects  of 
ancient  Greek  life  and  thought.  Since  “  life  and 
thought  ”  really  comprise  the  entire  civilization  in  all 
its  manifold  manifestations,  only  special  topics  have 
been,  and  obviously  could  be,  chosen  for  consideration. 
In  general,  I  have  preferred  to  omit  discussion  of  many 
details  of  Greek  Private  Life,  such  as  Clothing,  Food, 
Sickness,  Burial  and  Marriage  Ceremonies,  etc.  It  is 
not  what  the  Greeks  ate  or  wore  that  is  of  compelling 
interest  and  importance  to  us  today;  it  is  what  they 
thought  and  achieved.  This  surely  is  true  —  every  sub¬ 
ject  discussed  in  this  book  is  of  importance  for  modern 
life. 

While  ancient  Greece  as  a  whole  from  earliest  times 
to  the  Graeco-Roman  Age  necessarily  is  under  our 
survey,  limitations  of  time  and  place  must  generally  be 
observed.  Strong  emphasis,  therefore,  will  be  laid  upon 
Athens  at  the  time  of  her  greatest  glory,  the  Age  of 
Pericles,  and  the  period  immediately  subsequent 
thereto. 

The  chapters  are  necessarily  brief  and  should  be  re¬ 
garded  as  largely  introductory  to  the  subjects  discussed. 
The  interested  reader  and  the  serious  student  should 
supplement  these  pages  by  consulting  the  more  detailed 


PREFACE 


IX 


and  extensive  treatment  to  be  found  in  the  appropriate 
works  which  are  cited  for  each  chapter  in  the  Biblio¬ 
graphical  Appendix  at  the  end  of  this  volume. 

It  is  my  hope  that  this  book  may  prove  of  value  not 
merely  as  a  text-book,  but  may  fulfil  a  wider  purpose. 
These  are  its  earnest  aims  no  doubt  imperfectly 
achieved:  To  assist  those  who  wish  a  better  under¬ 
standing  of  ancient  Greek  civilization  and  culture;  to 
help  readers  to  obtain  a  more  intelligent  appreciation 
of  the  Greek  genius ;  and  to  convey  a  clearer  realization 
of  the  great  indebtedness  of  the  world  today  to  our 
Hellenic  antecedents. 

It  is  impossible  to  express  my  indebtedness  in  every 
case  for  what  I  have  written  in  this  book.  The  subjects 
are  so  numerous,  my  own  reading  has  been  so  extensive, 
and  sources  are  not  always  now  easy  to  recall.  This 
indebtedness  is  necessarily  great.  It  is  certain,  how¬ 
ever,  that  in  the  following  chapters  I  owe  much  to 
these  books:  Chapter  VII,  Gardiner,  E.  N.,  Greek 
Athletic  Sports  and  Festivals;  VIII,  Zimmern,  A.  E., 
The  Greek  Commonwealth;  IX,  Hall,  F.  W.,  Compan¬ 
ion  to  Classical  Texts;  XVII,  Moore,  C.  H.,  Religious 
Thought  of  the  Greeks;  XX,  Livingstone,  R.  W.,  The 
Greek  Genius  and  its  Meaning  to  Us.  Chapter  XIX 
appeared,  in  part,  in  the  New  York  Times  of  April  16, 
1922.  A  considerable  portion  of  Chapter  VIII  was 
published  in  The  Classical  Journal ,  May,  1919.  In 
Chapter  XI,  The  “  Encomium  on  Helen  57  of  Gorgias 
appeared  in  The  Classical  Weekly ,  February  15,  1913. 

I  wish  to  express  my  thanks  and  obligations  to  my 
friends  Professors  Edward  Capps  and  Donald  Clive 
Stuart  of  Princeton  University,  and  to  my  colleagues 
Professors  Charles  Knapp,  Edward  Delavan  Perry,  and 
Clarence  H.  Young.  These  scholars  have  read  portions 
of  the  manuscript  and  made  numerous  helpful  sugges¬ 
tions.  For  the  illustrations  I  am  greatly  indebted  to 
Professor  Young,  who  generously  put  at  my  service  his 
collection  of  Greek  photographs. 

New  York,  April,  1923. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

Preface  .  vii 

I.  Sources  of  Information .  i 

II.  Greek  States  Apart  From  Attica .  6 

III.  Attica  and  Athens .  17 

IV.  Architecture  and  the  Monuments  of  Athens  23 

V.  House,  Furniture,  and  Vases .  37 

VI.  Sculpture .  46 

VII.  Athletic  Sports  and  Festivals .  63 

VIII.  Political,  Social,  and  Economic  Conditions  of 

the  Athenian  People  .  t .  79 

IX.  Writing  and  Books . 114 

X.  Literature . 122 

XI.  Athenian  Education . 152 

XII.  Theater  and  the  Production  of  Plays  ...  172 

XIII.  Tragedy  . 185 

XIV.  Characteristics  of  Attic  Tragedy . 200 

XV.  Comedy . 212 

XVI.  Philosophy . 217 

XVII.  Religion . , . 252 

XVIII.  Science . 271 

XIX.  The  New  Study  of  Ancient  Greece . 280 

XX.  The  Genius  of  the  Greeks . 287 

Bibliographical  Appendix . 297 

Index . .  319 


XI 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


FIGURE  PAGE 

1.  View  of  the  Acropolis  from  the  West  (Photograph  by 

Professor  C.  H.  Young) . Frontispiece 

2.  Map  of  Ancient  Greece  (from  Harper’s  Dictionary  of 

Classical  Literature  &  Antiquities  (Copyright.  By 
special  arrangement  with  American  Book  Co.)  .  .  6 

3.  Mt.  Olympus  and  Petra  Pass  (Photograph  by  S.  C. 

Atchley) .  10 

4.  Delphi:  View  from  Theater  of  the  Foundations  of  the 

the  Temple  of  Apollo  and  Valley  (S.  C.  A.)  .  .  .  .  10 

5.  Mycenae:  The  Lions’ Gate .  n 

6.  Corinth:  The  Temple  of  Apollo  and  Acro-Corinth  (J.  D. 

Young) .  11 

7.  Mt.  Pentelicus  from  the  S.  E.  (C.  H.  Y.)  18 

8.  Marathon:  The  Burial-Mound  (C.  H.  Y.) .  18 

9.  Mt.  Hymettus:  View  from  the  Parthenon  (C.  H.  Y.)  .  19 

10.  Sunium:  The  Temple  of  Poseidon  (C.  H.  Y.)  ....  19 

11.  The  Ceramicus:  The  Ancient  Athenian  Cemetery 

(C.  H.  Y.) .  20 

12.  The  Areopagus:  Athens  (C.  H.  Y.) .  20 

13.  Plan  of  Ancient  Athens  (From  Harrison  and  Verrall, 

Mythology  and  Monuments  of  Ancient  Athens ,  Mac¬ 
millan)  .  21 

14.  The  Three  Orders  of  Greek  Architecture  (From  Stat- 

ham,  H.  H.,  A  Short  Critical  History  of  Architecture , 
Batsford,  London) .  25 

15.  TheTheseum:  Athens  (S.  C.  A.) .  28 

16.  The  Monument  of  Lysicrates  (C.  H.  Y.) .  28 

17.  The  Temple  of  the  Wingless  Victory  or  Nike  Apteros 

(J.  D.  Y.) .  29 

18.  The  Propylaea  (Entrance  Gates  to  the  Acropolis)  from 

the  Eastern  Side  (C.  H.  Y.) .  29 

19.  The  Olympieum  (Temple  of  Olympian  Zeus)  at  Athens 

C.  H.  Y.) .  30 

xiii 


XIV 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


FIGURE  PAGE 

20.  The  Ancient  Stadium  at  Athens;  Restored  (C.  H.  Y.)  .  30 

21.  Plan  of  the  Acropolis  (From  Weller,  C.  H.,  Athens  and 

its  Monuments  (Macmillan) .  31 

22.  The  Parthenon  (S.  C.  A.) .  36 

23.  The  Parthenon  reconstructed  at  Nashville,  Tenn. 

(From  Art  and  Archaeology ,  Aug.  1921) .  36 

24.  The  Erechtheum  (C.  H.  Y.) .  36 

25.  Shapes  of  Athenian  Black-figured  Vases  (Metropolitan 

Museum  of  Art,  New  York) .  37 

26.  Shapes  of  Athenian  Black-figured  Vases  (Metropolitan 

Museum  of  Art,  New  York) .  44 

27.  The  Acropolis  Maiden  dedicated  by  Euthydicus 

(Athens) .  50 

28.  The  Stele  of  Aristion  by  Aristocles  (Athens) .  50 

2p.  Figure  from  the  Temple  of  Aphaia  at  Aegina .  50 

30.  The  Victory  of  Paeonius  (Olympia) .  51 

31.  The  Victory  of  Samothrace  (Louvre) .  51 

32.  The  so-called  Theseus  from  the  E.  pediment  of  the  Par¬ 

thenon  (British  Museum) .  52 

33.  The  so-called  Three  Fates  from  the  E.  pediment  of  the 

Parthenon  (British  Museum) .  52 

34.  Horsemen  of  the  Parthenon  Frieze .  52 

35.  The  Hermes  of  Praxiteles  at  Olympia  (From  a  photo¬ 

graph  by  Professor  Clarence  Kennedy)  ....  53 

36.  The  Bronze  Charioteer  (Delphi) .  53 

37.  The  Aphrodite  of  Melos  (Venus  of  Milo)  in  the  Louvre  60 

38.  The  Aphrodite  (Venus)  of  Capua .  60 

39.  The  Doryphorus,  after  Polyclitus  (Naples) .  62 

40.  The  Apoxyomenus,  after  Lysippus  (Vatican) .  62 

41.  The  Discobolus,  after  Myron .  62 

42.  Bronze  Head  of  an  Ephebe  (Munich) . 163 

43.  Girl  Runner  (Vatican) . 163 

44.  Ground-plan  of  the  Theater  at  Epidaurus  (From  Dorp- 

feld  and  Reisch,  Das  griechische  Theater) . 173 

45.  The  Theater  at  Epidaurus  (C.  H.  Y.) . 174 

46.  The  Theater  at  Athens  (J.  D.  Y.) . 174 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 

A  PORTRAYAL  OF  GREEK  CIVILIZATION 

CHAPTER  I 

THE  SOURCES  OF  OUR  INFORMATION 

“  To  Greece  we  owe  the  love  of  Science,  the  love  of  Art,  the 
love  of  Freedom:  not  Science  alone,  Art  alone,  or  Freedom  alone, 
but  these  vitally  correlated  with  one  another  and  brought  into 
organic  union.  And  in  this  union  we  recognize  the  distinctive 
features  of  the  West.  The  Greek  genius  is  the  European  genius 
in  its  first  and  brightest  bloom.”  —  S.  H.  Butcher. 

The  ancient  literature  and  the  monuments  are 
our  chief  sources  of  information  in  obtaining 
a  knowledge  of  Greek  life  and  thought.  Greek 
literature,  originally  of  great  bulk,  has  suffered  griev¬ 
ously  in  the  course  of  the  centuries  for  reasons  subse¬ 
quently  to  be  related;  yet  in  spite  of  the  great  losses 
which  it  has  sustained  we  fortunately  possess  a  literary 
heritage  of  very  considerable  extent  and  priceless  value. 
For  the  early  period  the  epic  poetry  of  Homer,  the  di¬ 
dactic  verse  of  Hesiod,  and  the  fragmentary  poems  of 
the  lyricists  are  the  only  literary  sources  of  knowledge, 
but  for  the  fifth  and  succeeding  centuries  voluminous 
prose  writings  throw  a  flood  of  light  particularly  upon 
Athenian  life.  Historical  events  are  narrated  by  Herod¬ 
otus,  Thucydides,  and  Xenophon;  public  and  private 
life  and  legal,  political,  and  social  conditions  are  re¬ 
vealed  in  the  speeches  of  Demosthenes,  Lysias,  and  the 
other  Attic  orators;  Plato’s  philosophical  writings  are 
preserved  in  their  entirety  and  the  numerous  works  of 
Aristotle  are  a  mine  of  information  of  all  kinds. 
Thirty-three  tragedies  of  Aeschylus,  Sophocles,  and 
Euripides,  rich  in  religious  and  ethical  ideas,  give  evi¬ 
dence  of  the  nature  and  importance  of  the  theater  and 


2 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


drama;  while  eleven  comedies  of  Aristophanes  reflect, 
although  in  the  mirror  of  caricature,  contemporary 
political,  social,  and  educational  conditions  and  public 
and  private  life  generally.  The  commentaries  and  liter¬ 
ary  collections  of  the  Alexandrian  scholars  and  writers 
and  the  Greek  authors  of  the  Roman  Age  explain  much 
that  would  otherwise  be  obscure.  Here  and  there,  too, 
in  Latin  literature  are  to  be  found  illuminating  com¬ 
ments  on  Greek  civilization. 

Until  about  fifty  years  ago  the  modern  world  knew 
ancient  Greece  largely  through  the  literature  alone. 
Now,  fortunately,  the  situation  is  vastly  different, 
because  of  archaeological  excavations  and  studies.  In 
fact  we  of  today  are  in  a  position  to  know  far  more  of 
early  Greece  than  Plato  and  Aristotle  because  of  the 
illuminating  revelations  of  the  spade.  Excavations  in 
the  island  of  Crete  have  unearthed  the  palace  of  King 
Minos  at  Cnossos  and  a  remarkable  civilization  which 
flourished  about  2800-1100  b.c.  Homeric  Troy  has 
been  uncovered  in  Asia  Minor.  Excavations  have  been 
and  are  being  prosecuted  throughout  the  Greek  world 
yielding  important  treasures.  Olympia,  Delphi,  Cor¬ 
inth,  Athens,  Eleusis,  Epidaurus,  Argos,  Mycenae, 
Tiryns  and  Sparta  in  Greece  itself;  Troy,  Sardes,  Per- 
gamum,  Ephesus,  and  Colophon  in  Asia  Minor; 
Delos,  Melos,  Thera,  and  Crete  of  the  islands;  Akragas 
(Agrigentum),  Syracuse,  Selinus,  and  Segesta  in  Sicily; 
these  are  some  of  the  more  important  sites  that  have 
richly  repaid  the  labors  of  the  archaeologist  and,  after 
many  centuries,  their  monuments  and  civilization  again 
stand  revealed  to  the  light  of  day.  These  monuments, 
for  the  most  part,  we  may  classify  as  examples  of  archi¬ 
tecture,  sculpture,  painting,  ceramics,  inscriptions,  and 
coins. 

Imposing  and  beautiful  remains  of  ancient  structures 
are  to  be  found  in  all  parts  of  the  Greek  world  —  in 
Sicily,  in  Magna  Graecia,  in  Asia  Minor,  and  in  Greece 
proper,  while  in  Athens  itself  and  on  its  sacred  Acropolis 
are  still  to  be  seen  the  marble  ruins  of  the  old-time  tern- 


THE  SOURCES  OF  OUR  INFORMATION  3 


pies  and  buildings.  Temples  and  theaters  are  the  chief 
examples  of  architecture  preserved. 

The  museums  of  the  world  are  stocked  with  original 
Greek  sculptures  of  marble  and  bronze.  Works  of  art 
found  in  Greece  may  no  longer  be  taken  from  that 
country,  and  consequently  the  museums  of  Athens  and 
of  lesser  centers,  e.g.,  Olympia,  Delphi,  Corinth,  Sparta, 
Thebes,  and  Eleusis,  possess,  in  numbers  ever  increas¬ 
ing,  artistic  treasures.  The  museums  of  Italy,  in  partic¬ 
ular  that  of  the  Vatican  in  Rome,  have  many  master¬ 
pieces.  The  British  Museum  in  London  contains  the 
priceless  Elgin  Marbles  from  the  Parthenon.  The 
Louvre  in  Paris  has  the  world’s  most  famous  statue,  the 
Aphrodite  of  Melos  (Venus  of  Milo),  and  the  Victory 
from  Samothrace.  In  Munich  are  the  marbles  from 
Aegina  and  in  Berlin  the  sculptures  from  Pergamum. 
In  the  museums  of  Boston  and  New  York  are  a  number 
of  excellent  examples  of  Greek  art.  These  statues, 
grave-reliefs,  and  terra-cottas  are  not  only  beautiful  as 
works  of  art,  but  they  contribute  to  our  knowledge  of 
Greek  dress,  costume,  and  physical  characteristics. 

Greek  painting,  being  naturally  of  perishable  nature, 
has  not  survived  to  the  present  day.  It  is  true  that 
painted  grave  monuments  of  considerable  merit  have 
been  unearthed  in  Thessaly.  Some  Greek  portraits 
of  late  date  have  been  found  in  Egyptian  excavations. 
The  Pompeian  mural  paintings  show  Greek  influence. 
But  the  great  works  of  such  renowned  artists  as  Apelles 
and  Polygnotus  have  perished.  The  artistic  drawings 
on  the  indestructible  terra-cotta  vases  abide,  however, 
and  countless  specimens  of  this  lovely  art-form  reveal 
in  manifold  ways  the  dress  and  appearance,  the  man¬ 
ners  and  customs  of  the  ancient  Hellenes. 

Inscriptions  tell  us  much  of  life  in  ancient  Greece. 
All  the  important  Athenian  laws  were  inscribed  on 
stone.  Hundreds  of  these  imperishable  witnesses  have 
been  preserved,  handing  down  the  letter  of  the  laws. 
We  possess  also  numerous  other  inscriptions  of  greatest 
value  informing  us  of  important  facts  in  matters  his- 


4 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


torical,  biographical,  religious,  medical,  economic,  the¬ 
atrical,  and  commercial. 

Coins,  too,  have  their  value  in  this  connection.  Each 
city-state  had  its  own  coinage.  These  coins  are  not 
only  noteworthy  as  examples  of  art,  but  they  are  in¬ 
formative  for  trade  and  commerce. 

Modem  Greece  to  a  limited  extent  contributes  to  our 
knowledge  of  the  life  and  customs  of  ancient  Hellas. 
Much  in  the  life  of  the  modern  Greeks  has  its  origin 
in  the  ancient  land.  It  must  not  be  forgotten  that  the 
Greeks  and  their  language  and  literature  have  had  a 
continuous  history  from  Homeric  times  to  the  present 
day,  thereby  revealing  a  vitality  of  language  and  genius 
almost  without  parallel.  It  cannot  be  expected  that 
the  ancient  Greek  racial  stock  should  have  come  down 
in  all  its  purity,  when  it  is  recalled  how  many  grievous 
political  vicissitudes  Hellas  has  suffered.  Romans, 
Slavs,  Venetians,  Germans,  Albanians,  and  Turks  over¬ 
running  and  subjugating  Greece  inevitably  have  left 
their  mark  on  the  people.  Now  and  then,  however,  in 
traveling  in  Greece  one  may  see,  especially  in  remote 
valley  or  settlement,  a  youth  or  maiden  of  classic  fea¬ 
tures  and  mien  who  might  have  served  as  a  model  for 
an  ancient  statue  or  for  a  graceful  figure  depicted  on 
a  vase. 

The  language  has  survived  in  a  remarkable  manner. 
It  is  a  mistake  to  speak  of  Greek  as  a  dead  language. 
Although,  as  has  been  well  said,  no  language  can  be 
called  dead  which  is  the  vehicle  of  an  immortal  litera¬ 
ture,  Latin,  in  a  sense,  is  no  longer  a  living  language, 
since  it  is  not  in  every-day  use  by  a  modern  people 
as  a  spoken  language.  It  has  been  superseded  by  its 
daughters,  the  Romance  tongues.  But  the  Greek  lan¬ 
guage  and  literature  have  had  an  uninterrupted  history 
throughout  the  ages.  Certain  changes  of  pronuncia¬ 
tion,  of  idiom,  and  of  syntax  naturally  have  been 
effected,  since  a  language  is  a  living  organism  that  con¬ 
stantly  changes,  but  modern  Greek  is  essentially  the 
ancient  language.  Demosthenes  would  find  little  diffi- 


THE  SOURCES  OF  OUR  INFORMATION  5 


culty  in  reading  the  better  class  periodicals  published 
in  Athens  today. 

These,  then,  are  the  chief  sources  of  our  information: 
the  literature,  continually  being  re-interpreted  by  each 
successive  generation;  the  monuments,  ever  increasing 
through  the  labors  of  archaeologists. 


< 


CHAPTER  II 

GREEK  STATES  APART  FROM  ATTICA 


A  cypress  dark  against  the  blue 
That  deepens  up  to  such  a  hue 
As  never  painter  dared  or  drew; 

A  marble  shaft  that  stands  alone 
Above  a  wreck  of  sculptured  stone 
With  grey -green  aloes  overgrown; 

A  hillside  scored  with  hollow  veins 
Through  age-long  wash  of  autumn  rains, 
As  purple  as  with  vintage  stains; 

And  rocks  that  while  the  hours  run 
Show  all  their  jewels  one  by  one 
For  pastime  of  the  summer  sun; 


A  crescent  sail  upon  the  sea, 

So  calm  and  fair  and  ripple-free, 

You  wonder  storms  can  ever  be; 

A  shore  with  deep  indented  bays, 

And,  o’er  the  gleaming  waterways, 

A  glimpse  of  islands  in  the  haze; 

A  face  bronzed  dark  to  red  and  gold, 
With  mountain  eyes  which  seem  to  hold 
The  freshness  of  the  world  of  old; 

A  shepherd’s  crook,  a  coat  of  fleece, 

A  grazing  flock  —  the  sense  of  peace  — 
The  long  sweet  silence  —  this  is  Greece. 

—  Rennel  Rodd. 


ALTHOUGH  our  primary  interest  lies  in  Attica 
and  Athens,  it  will  be  illuminating  to  survey 
briefly  other  parts  of  Greece  in  an  effort  to  dis¬ 
cover  their  nature,  and  that  we  may  discern  what  roles 
these  states  played  in  Hellenic  affairs  and  what  contri¬ 
butions  they  made  to  Greek  life  and  thought,  particu¬ 
larly  in  comparison  with,  or  in  contrast  to,  Attica. 

A  few  words  about  the  land  and  the  people  as  a  whole 
may  fittingly  preface  this  chapter. 

The  Hellenic  race  occupied  the  Balkan  peninsula, 
a  land  of  small  area  (about  25,000  square  miles)  ex¬ 
tending  southward  into  the  Mediterranean  Sea.  The 
peculiar  physical  character  of  the  land  profoundly  in¬ 
fluenced  the  life  and  history  of  the  people.  The  coun¬ 
try  is  divided  into  a  number  of  small  plains  or  plateaux 
by  numerous  chains  of  mountains  of  limestone.  These 
mountains  are  not  of  great  height,  yet  they  are  suffi¬ 
ciently  lofty  and  precipitous  to  form  imposing  barriers 
to  people  in  ancient  days  when  methods  of  travel  and 
communication  were  primitive  in  nature.  The  highest 

6 


Fig.  2.  Map  of  Ancient  Greece 

From  Harper’s  “Dictionary  of  Classical  Literature  and  Antiquities,”  Copyright.  American  Book 

Company,  Publishers. 


GREEK  STATES  APART  FROM  ATTICA  7 


mountain  is  Mt.  Olympus  (Fig.  3),  in  northern  Greece, 
nearly  10,000  feet  in  height,  the  fabled  home  of  the 
gods.  Between  7000  and  8000  feet  high  are  Parnassus, 
north  of  Delphi,  beloved  of  the  Muses;  Taygetus,  which 
towers  above  the  plain  of  Sparta;  and  Cyllene  and 
Erymanthus,  mountains  of  pastoral  Arcadia,  the  former 
known  to  Hermes,  the  latter  the  haunt  of  the  wild 
boar  slain  by  Heracles. 

Of  even  greater  influence  upon  the  people  was  the 
sea,  which  everywhere  cuts  into  the  land,  forming  in¬ 
numerable  inlets,  bays,  and  gulfs.,  The  gulf  of  Corinth, 
in  fact,  well-nigh  cuts  off  the  Peloponnese.  The  coast¬ 
line  of  Greece  is  therefore  of  truly  remarkable  length 
and  afforded  numerous  harbors,  an  encouragement  to 
navigation.  The  Greeks  in  consequence  were  a  mari¬ 
time  folk  and  commerce  and  colonization  naturally 
flourished. 

The  climate  of  Greece  is  profoundly  affected  by  the 
varying  altitudes  of  the  mountains  and  by  the  prox¬ 
imity  of  the  sea.  The  temperature  is  mild,  although 
bracing  except  in  the  dry,  hot  summer  season.  The 
winter,  which  is  the  wet  season,  is  short  and  not  severe. 
The  winds  are  quite  constant,  a  boon  to  sailors.  The 
rivers  for  the  most  part  are  insignificant  because  of  the 
shortness  of  their  courses,  and  often  dry  up  almost  com¬ 
pletely  in  the  dry  season.  Only  the  Peneus  and  the 
Spercheus  in  northern  Greece,  the  Achelous  in  Aetolia, 
and  the  Alpheus  in  Elis  may  be  designated  rivers  in 
the  real  sense  of  the  word,  although  even  these  streams 
are  not  navigable  for  modern  vessels.  The  rocky  soil 
of  Hellas  is  thin  and  not  very  fertile  except  in  a  few 
districts,  as,  for  example,  Thessaly,  although  the  grape 
and  the  olive  flourished  and  smaller  live-stock,  such  as 
goats,  sheep,  and  swine,  were  abundant. 

The  scenery  of  Greece,  although  neither  opulent  in 
its  nature  nor  majestic  in  character,  is  of  appealing 
beauty  and  abiding  charm.  Particularly  in  the  loveli¬ 
ness  produced  by  color  may  the  observer  find  pleasure. 
No  sea  is  bluer  than  the  Aegean,  no  sky,  no  atmosphere 


8 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


clearer  than  those  of  Hellas.  The  pink  tones  of  rock 
and  mountain,  the  greens  of  the  scattered  vegetation, 
the  brilliance  of  the  many  wild-flowers,  the  play  of 
light  and  shadow  on  mountain  walls,  the  purples  and 
violets  of  reflected  glories  as  the  sun  sinks  at  evening  — 
all  these  delight  the  eye  and  entrance  the  soul. 

The  origin  of  the  Greek  people  is  lost  in  obscurity. 
The  Hellenes,  a  branch  of  the  Indo-Europeans,  and 
consisting  of  a  number  of  tribes,  began  soon  after  2000 
b.c.,  perhaps,  moving  southward  from  the  region  of 
the  Black  Sea  and  the  Danube,  and  in  successive  waves 
of  invasion  gradually  occupied  the  whole  peninsula 
to  the  south.  They  found  the  land  already  occupied, 
as  at  the  citadels  of  Tiryns  and  Mycenae  in  the  Pelo¬ 
ponnesus,  by  a  people  which  we  call  the  Aegean  or  Med¬ 
iterranean  race,  but  the  native  inhabitants,  who  pos¬ 
sessed  a  flourishing  civilization,  were  conquered  or  dis¬ 
possessed.  The  islands  of  the  Aegean  of  which  the 
most  important  was  Crete,  the  seat  of  a  remarkable 
civilization,  and  the  coast  of  Asia  Minor  were  next 
conquered  and  occupied,  in  the  south  by  those  Greeks 
called  Dorians,  in  the  middle  portions  by  the  Ionians, 
and  in  the  north  by  the  Aeolians. 

Thus  it  came  about  that  the  Greek  race  of  the  his¬ 
torical  period  was  the  result  of  a  fusion  of  the  original 
Greek  with  the  native  Aegean  stock.  But  it  was  the 
Greek  language  that  triumphed  and  became  universal 
(the  old  Aegean  language  of  which  we  have  an  example 
in  Crete  has  not  yet  been  deciphered),  and  although 
the  Greek  elements  were  widely  scattered  over  the 
whole  eastern  Mediterranean  world  and  spoke  different 
dialects,  yet  a  common  blood,  language,  religion,  ideals, 
and  characteristics  made  kindred  the  whole  race  called 
Hellenes.  So  it  was  that  the  Aegean  Civilization  of  the 
Bronze  Age  ( ca .  3000-1000  b.c.)  was  followed  by  the 
Greek  Civilization  which  arose  about  1000  b.c.,  the 
beginning  of  the  Iron  Age.  The  succeeding  cen¬ 
turies  saw  the  remarkable  rise,  development,  culmina¬ 
tion,  and  gradual  decline  of  the  Greek  civilization. 

\ 


GREEK  STATES  APART  FROM  ATTICA  9 


The  ages  of  the  kings,  nobles,  and  tyrants  were  suc¬ 
ceeded  by  the  rise  and  triumph  in  the  fifth  and  fourth 
centuries  b.c.  of  the  empire  and  cultured  democracy 
of  Athens  and  the  power  of  the  military  states,  Sparta 
and  Thebes.  The  Macedonian  phalanxes  of  Philip 
trampled  under  foot  the  army  of  Athens  at  Chaeronea 
in  Boeotia  in  338  b.c.  Philip’s  son  Alexander  extended 
his  father’s  conquests.  But  along  with  the  armies  of 
Alexander,  as  he  subjugated  Asia  and  Africa,  went  the 
Greek  language  and  civilization  to  usher  in  the  Hellen¬ 
istic  Age  with  Alexandria,  founded  in  332  b.c.,  as  its 
center.  Finally,  with  the  capture  of  Corinth  by  the 
Roman  consul  Mummius  in  146  b.c.,  Greece  became 
politically  a  Roman  province.  But,  as  Horace  well 
says,  “  Greece  when  captured  took  captive  her  rough 
captor  ”  ( Graecia  capta  jerum  victorem  cepit.  Ep.  II. 
1. 156). 

To  the  north  of  Greece  proper  lies  Macedonia.  While 
the  Macedonians  were  not  regarded  as  genuine  Greeks, 
yet  they  spoke  a  Greek  dialect.  They  have  left  no  liter¬ 
ature  and  were  of  no  political  importance  until,  in  the 
fourth  century  b.c.,  Philip  established  his  monarchy 
and  built  up  that  formidable  military  machine  which 
finally  succeeded  in  crushing  Athenian  supremacy. 
Demosthenes,  the  unremitting  foe  of  Philip  as  revealed 
in  his  Philippic  and  Olynthiac  orations,  in  an  eloquent 
passage,  thus  contrasts  Philip  and  his  provincial  Mace¬ 
donian  capital  with  the  Athenians  and  their  culture: 
“  Verily,  no  one  indeed  would  dare  assert  this  —  that 
it  was  fitting  that  he  who  was  reared  in  Pella,  a  place 
without  repute  at  that  time  and  insignificant,  should 
possess  such  ambition  as  to  set  his  heart  on  ruling  the 
Greeks  and  should  entertain  this  great  ambition,  while 
you  who  are  in  truth  Athenians,  who  daily  in  all  you 
see  and  hear  contemplate  memorials  of  your  ancestors’ 
virtues,  have  in  your  natures  such  great  baseness  as 
to  yield  up  voluntarily  to  Philip  your  freedom!  Surely 
no  man  would  dare  affirm  this!  ”  Philip,  however,  as 
a  youth  had  resided  as  a  hostage  in  Thebes,  where  he 


10 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


received  a  Greek  education  and  a  military  training, 
and  this,  coupled  with  great  natural  ability,  enabled 
him  to  overcome  all  obstacles  and  eventually  to  become 
political  master  of  Greece. 

To  the  south  of  Macedon  lies  Thessaly,  the  northern¬ 
most  province  of  Greece  proper.  The  Thessalians,  a 
people  of  many  tribes  of  which  some  were  not  of  pure 
Greek  stock,  occupied  the  largest  and  most  fertile  plain 
in  Greece.  This  district,  drained  by  the  Peneus,  was 
famous  for  its  crops,  its  horses  and  oxen.  The  latter 
part  of  the  course  of  the  Peneus  is  through  that  rocky 
mountain  gorge  and  pass,  the  Vale  of  Tempe,  whose 
scenic  beauty  is  extolled  in  ancient  and  modern  verse, 
“  the  long  divine  Peneian  pass  ”  of  Tennyson.  Herodo¬ 
tus  asserts  that  formerly  all  Thessaly  was  a  vast  lake, 
but  that  Poseidon,  as  men  say,  drained  it  by  cleav¬ 
ing  with  a  powerful  blow  of  his  trident  the  mountain 
wall  between  Mounts  Olympus  and  Ossa.  This  state¬ 
ment  of  the  Father  of  History  is  doubtless  correct,  al¬ 
though  modern  geologists  would  not  use  identical  ter¬ 
minology. 

At  an  early  period,  when  Athens  was  an  insignificant 
settlement,  Thessaly  was  inhabited  by  powerful  tribes 
and  ruled  by  a  proud  nobility  and  princes.  The  hero 
of  the  Iliad ,  the  warrior  Achilles,  was  a  Thessalian. 
But  in  later  days  the  Thessalians  were  contemned  as 
boors  by  the  cultured  Athenians,  and  were  even  called 
traitors,  as  they  were  accused  of  favoring  the  Persians 
and  later  the  Macedonians.  In  behalf  of  the  Thes¬ 
salians  it  may  be  said  that  because  of  their  geograph¬ 
ical  situation  they  were  constantly  exposed,  as  a  bor¬ 
der  state,  to  incursions  of  enemies  from  the  north.  For 
southern  Greece  they  constituted  a  buffer  state.  It  is 
difficult  for  a  people  thus  situated  to  progress  in  arts 
and  literature.  No  literature  and  no  important  ruins 
are  of  Thessalian  origin.  Yet  the  Thessalians  were  not 
altogether  cut  off  from  intercourse  with  the  more  south¬ 
ern  Greeks.  Pindar  and  Simonides  wrote  odes  in  praise 
of  Thessalian  princes,  and  archaeologists  have  discov¬ 
ered  in  Thessaly  painted  grave-reliefs  of  some  merit. 


Fig.  4.  Delphi:  Theater,  Temple  of  Apollo,  and 

Valley 


Fig.  6.  Corinth:  Temple  of  Apollo  and  Acro-Corinth 


GREEK  STATES  APART  FROM  ATTICA  11 


Between  Thessaly  on  the  north  and  Attica  on  the 
south  the  most  important  state  was  Boeotia.  The 
nimble-witted  and  highly  cultivated  Athenians  had  con¬ 
tempt  for  their  somewhat  stolid  neighbors  to  the  north 
and  designated  them  as  stupid  and  “  swinish.”  The 
result  is  that  even  today  the  term  Boeotian  is  applied 
to  a  boorish,  slow-witted,  or  unesthetic  person.  It  is 
true  that  Thebes  never  rivaled  Athens  except  during 
the  few  years  between  the  victory  of  Leuctra  (371  b.c.) 
and  the  defeat  at  Man  tinea  (362  b.c.),  when  she 
held  brief  military  and  political  hegemony.  Thebes  has 
bequeathed  us  no  extensive  literature  and  no  important 
works  of  art.  Architecturally  the  capital  city  was  mean 
and  insignificant.  But  it  must  not  be  forgotten  that 
Pindar,  the  great  lyric  poet,  was  a  Theban,  and  that 
Hesiod  lived  in  Ascra,  a  Boeotian  village.  Further¬ 
more,  at  a  small  village  in  southern  Boeotia  have  been 
excavated  fine  examples  of  those  charming  and  artistic 
little  terra-cottas  which  bear  the  name  Tanagra  figu¬ 
rines  from  the  place  where  first  they  were  found.  Of 
the  ancient  capital-city,  Thebes,  with  its  famous  seven 
gates  as  described  in  the  Persians  of  Aeschylus  and  its 
citadel,  the  Cadmea  of  Thebes,  the  seat  of  rule  of  Cad¬ 
mus,  of  Laius,  and  of  Oedipus,  almost  nothing  remains. 
The  level  plains  of  Boeotia  were  the  scenes  of  several 
fateful  battles,  Plataea  (479  b.c.),  where  the  invading 
Persians  were  decisively  defeated,  Leuctra  (371  b.c.), 
where  Epaminondas  by  his  victory  over  Sparta  won 
temporary  supremacy  for  Thebes  in  Grecian  affairs,  and 
Chaeronea  (338  b.c.),  where  Athens  fell  before  Philip 
of  Macedon.  Near  Boeotia’s  western  boundary  rises 
Mount  Helicon,  the  storied  abode  of  the  Muses,  while 
on  the  south,  on  the  Attic  frontier,  stretches  the  lofty 
mountain  wall  of  Cithaeron,  on  whose  slopes  the  infant 
Oedipus,  so  ran  the  myth,  was  exposed.  Thebes  is  only 
some  fifty  miles  distant  from  Athens,  but  the  two  cities 
were  a  thousand  miles  apart  so  far  as  sympathies  and 
intellectual  and  cultural  intercourse  were  concerned. 

To  the  west  of  Boeotia  lay  Phocis,  a  small  state,  but 


12 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


of  great  importance,  as  the  seat  of  Delphi.  Here,  amid 
splendid  and  awe-inspiring  scenery  on  the  side  of  Mount 
Parnassus,  were  the  center  of  Apollo’s  worship,  the 
home  of  his  temple  and  oracle,  and  the  sacred  Casta- 
lian  spring.  The  cult  of  the  Pythian  Apollo  at  Delphi 
was  one  of  the  most  important  manifestations  of  Greek 
religion.  The  greater  states  of  Greece  built  permanent 
treasure  houses  at  Delphi  wherein  to  house  their  costly 
dedicatory  offerings  to  the  god  of  prophecy,  of  health, 
and  of  light.  The  Amphictyonic  League  met  annually 
in  the  spring  at  Delphi.  Here  the  Pythian  Games  were 
celebrated  every  four  years.  Deputations  bearing  gifts 
to  the  god  from  every  part  of  the  Greek  world  were 
constantly  arriving  to  consult  the  Pythian  oracle.  No 
visitor  today  should  fail  to  see  Delphi  (Fig.  4),  where 
the .  French  excavations  have  uncovered  the  whole 
sacred  precinct  with  the  ruins  of  the  Pythian  temple,  the 
treasuries,  theater,  stadium,  and  winding  sacred  road. 

To  the  west  of  Phocis  were  Aetolia  and  Acarnania, 
flourishing  states,  but  comparatively  negligible  in  Greek 
political  and  literary  history  of  the  classical  period. 

South  of  the  Corinthian  Gulf  is  the  Peloponnesus, 
the  southern  part  of  Greece,  containing  a  number  of 
places  of  importance. 

The  city  of  Corinth,  a  great  commercial  center,  stood 
at  the  western  extremity  of  the  Isthmus.  At  the  foot 
of  the  lofty  Acro-Corinth  (Fig.  6)  is  the  site  of  the 
ancient  city,  where  for  some  years  the  American  School 
of  Classical  Studies  at  Athens  has  conducted  excava¬ 
tions.  The  fountains  of  Pirene  and  Glauce  have  been 
disclosed,  a  sacred  way  and  ruins  of  a  theater  revealed, 
and  the  foundations  of  numerous  buildings  uncovered. 
The  excavations  have  not  yielded  many  important  works 
of  art,  and  this  is  not  surprising  when  we  recall  that 
in  146  b.c.  Mummius,  the  Roman  consul,  sacked  Cor¬ 
inth  and  despoiled  the  city  of  its  artistic  treasures.  It 
may  be  explained  that  the  carrying  off  of  Greek  works 
of  art  by  the  Romans  became  a  regular  practice  and 


GREEK  STATES  APART  FROM  ATTICA  13 


shiploads  of  statues  were  sent  to  Italy  to  adorn  Roman 
buildings  and  villas.  Not  many  years  ago  sponge- 
divers  engaged  in  their  occupation  off  the  island  of 
Cythera,  south  of  the  Peloponnesus,  were  astonished  to 
find  strewn  on  the  bottom  of  the  sea  some  fifty  statues, 
the  cargo  of  some  wrecked  Roman  galley.  Unhappily 
the  action  of  the  sea-water  through  the  centuries  had 
seriously  marred  their  beauty,  but  one  statue,  a  splen¬ 
did  bronze  figure  of  a  youth,  is  now  a  prized  possession 
of  the  National  Museum  in  Athens. 

In  Argolis,  south  of  Corinth,  are  several  cities  of 
great  importance  in  pre-historic  days,  celebrated  in 
Homer  and  of  great  interest  to  the  student  of  today, 
namely,  Mycenae,  “  rich-in-gold,”  the  capital  city  of 
Agamemnon,  leader  of  the  Trojan  expedition,  and 
Tiryns,  mighty  castle-fortress.  Argos,  too,  and  the  Ar- 
give  Heraeum  excavated  by  the  Americans  are  near. 
The  excavations  of  Dr.  Schliemann  at  Mycenae  made 
the  world  first  acquainted  with  that  flourishing  and 
early  era  called  Mycenaean  (1500-1200  b.c.).  At 
Mycenae  within  the  well-known  Lions’  Gate  (Fig.  5) 
and  on  the  citadel  Dr.  Schliemann  excavated  five  tombs 
which  contained  many  treasures  such  as  masks,  cups, 
and  daggers  wrought  largely  of  gold  and  beautifully  and 
artistically  fashioned. 

The  latest  investigations  (1921)  at  Mycenae  by  the 
British  School  “  leave  the  question  open  whether  the 
power  and  the  wealth  of  the  city  was  due  to  conquest 
and  colonization  from  Crete  or  to  peaceful  penetration 
by  trade  and  the  like.  Whatever  the  cause,  the  culture 
of  the  mainland  suddenly  became  saturated  with  Mi- 
noan  influence.” 

Also  in  Argolis  was  Epidaurus,  the  center  of  the  wor¬ 
ship  of  the  god  of  healing,  Asclepius  (the  Roman  Aes¬ 
culapius).  Here  many  interesting  inscriptions  have 
been  unearthed  which  were  carved  in  honor  of  the  god 
and  testify  to  miraculous  cures  effected  by  the  deity. 
The  theater  of  Epidaurus  is  the  best  preserved  of  all 


14 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


the  ancient  Greek  structures  of  its  kind  and  seated  per¬ 
haps  thirty  thousand  spectators. 

In  northwestern  Peloponnesus  Elis  was  politically  of 
little  importance  as  a  state,  but  it  contained  Olympia, 
on  the  river  Alpheus,  the  scene  of  the  celebration  of  the 
great  Panhellenic  festival-games  in  honor  of  Zeus, 
which  were  held  every  four  years  and  attracted  visitors 
from  every  part  of  the  Greek  world.  Excavations  here 
by  the  Germans  have  uncovered  the  whole  Altis  or 
sacred  precinct,  with  the  foundations  of  many  build¬ 
ings,  chief  of  which  are  the  temples  of  Zeus  and  Hera. 
A  museum  erected  at  Olympia  contains  the  works  of 
art  discovered  there,  including  the  famous  statue  of 
Hermes  by  Praxiteles,  the  Victory  of  Paeonius,  and  the 
sculptured  pediment  groups  from  the  temple  of  Zeus. 

In  central  Peloponnesus  was  mountainous  and  pas¬ 
toral  Arcadia  and,  in  the  southern  part,  lay  Messenia. 

Chief  of  all  the  Peloponnesian  states  was,  of  course, 
Sparta,  Athens’  great  and  only  rival  in  ancient  Greece 
—  a  rival,  not  in  literature,  as  Spartan  writers  were  few 
and  their  literary  remains  are  scanty;  a  rival,  not  in  art 
or  architecture,  as  Sparta  had  no  Phidias,  no  Poly- 
gnotus.  Nor  were  the  Spartans  comparable  with  the 
Athenians  in  refinement  or  polish.  But  the  two  states 
clashed  over  the  political  hegemony  of  Greece  and  long 
and  bitterly  did  they  contest  in  the  Peloponnesian  War 
from  431  b.c.,  until,  in  403  b.c.,  the  Spartans  tri¬ 
umphed.  In  political  ideals  the  two  states  were  poles 
apart,  as  Sparta  believed  that  the  individual  exists  for 
the  State;  Athens,  that  the  State  exists  for  the  individ¬ 
ual.  The  aim  of  Spartan  education  was  to  produce  the 
brave  and  hardy  soldier;  the  Athenian  ideal  was  to 
prepare  the  youth  for  citizenship  and  for  life  in  the 
fullest  sense.  And  yet  it  should  be  added  that  the  Spar¬ 
tan  constitution,  government,  and  laws  were  admired 
for  their  efficiency,  and  were  approved  by  Plato  and 
Aristotle  in  their  writings  devoted  to  the  ideal  common¬ 
wealth.  But  these  thinkers  were  not  in  entire  sympa¬ 
thy  with  a  democratic  form  of  government. 


GREEK  STATES  APART  FROM  ATTICA  15 

It  is  natural  to  attribute  to  a  country  itself  the  char¬ 
acteristics  of  its  inhabitants,  and  so,  recalling  the  Spar¬ 
tan  as  we  know  him  —  severe,  rugged,  and  martial  — 
we  might  well  picture  him  living  in  a  stern,  unattractive 
land.  Yet  hardly  any  city  in  Greece  has  a  lovelier 
situation  than  Sparta,  which  lies  at  the  foot  of  Mt. 
Taygetus,  towering  over  “  hollow  Lacedaemon.”  Flow¬ 
ing  through  the  town  is  the  shallow,  rippling  Eurotas, 
which  waters  in  its  course  the  flourishing  fruit  orchards, 
today  mainly  orange  and  olive.  It  is  a  beautiful  spot, 
although  it  was  unloved  by  the  Muses  and  Graces. 
The  modern  town  of  the  same  name  is  built  on  the 
ancient  site  and  has  the  same  broad  streets,  unusual 
in  eastern  lands,  which  characterized  the  city  in 
Homer’s  poetry. 

Recent  excavations  by  the  British  at  Sparta  seem 
to  show  that  the  Spartans  were  not  always  so  severe 
in  their  attitude  towards  life.  In  early  times  they  were 
patrons  of  art  and  poetry,  but  after  the  end  of  the 
seventh  century  b.c.,  with  the  conscious  adoption  of  a 
rigorous  constitution  and  military  ideals,  their  civiliza¬ 
tion  suffered  a  drastic  change. 

When  we  think  of  Greek  civilization  we  naturally 
think  of  Greece  proper  and  especially  of  Athens.  And 
yet  it  must  not  be  forgotten  that  the  Greeks  were 
scattered  over  a  wide  area  and  each  far-flung  colony  or 
center  made  its  contribution.  In  Asia  Minor,  Ionia 
gave  birth  to  thinkers  and  writers  of  History,  Geog¬ 
raphy,  Geology,  Cosmogony,  Science,  Philosophy,  and 
Sophistic.  In  Lesbos,  Ceos,  and  other  Aegean  isles 
lived  and  sang  such  gifted  poets  as  Sappho,  Alcaeus, 
Simonides,  and  Archilochus.  To  the  west  in  Sicily  and 
southern  Italy  (called  Magna  Graecia ),  early  colo¬ 
nized  by  Hellenes,  were  established  numerous  cities 
destined  to  become  richer  and  more  populous  even  than 
their  mother-cities.  The  founders  of  formal  Greek 
rhetoric,  of  literary  comedy,  and  of  pastoral  poetry 
were  of  Sicily.  Imposing  ruins  of  ancient  temples  and 
buildings  may  be  seen  today  at  Paestum  in  Italy,  and 


16 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


at  Segesta,  Selinus,  Syracuse,  and  Girgenti  (the  Greek 
Akragas ,  the  Roman  Agrigentum )  in  Sicily,  —  monu¬ 
ments  which  still  bear  witness  to  the  wealth  and  glory 
of  those  western  tyrants  and  patrons  of  the  arts  such 
as  Hieron  and  Theron.  The  importance  of  Sicily  in 
the  history  of  Greek  civilization  should  not  be  under¬ 
estimated. 


CHAPTER  III 

ATTICA  AND  ATHENS 


“  Athens,  the  eye  of  Greece,  mother  of  arts 
And  eloquence.”  —  Milton. 


OF  ALL  the  many  places  inhabited  by  the 
Greeks,  Attica  preeminently  claims  our  atten¬ 
tion.  It  is  a  tiny  district  judged  by  our  gener¬ 
ous  standards  of  territorial  area.  Indeed,  it  is  not  as 
large  as  our  smallest  state,  Rhode  Island,  yet  because 
of  the  genius  and  accomplishments  of  its  inhabitants, 
only  a  few  hundred  thousand  in  number,  it  will  ever 
be  venerated. 

Attica  is  a  rocky  triangular  district  stretching  south¬ 
eastward  from  Boeotia  to  Cape  Sunium.  The  north¬ 
western  boundary  was  the  mountain  wall  formed  by 
Parnes  (some  4600  feet  in  height)  and  Cithaeron,  the 
passes  over  which  were  guarded  by  frontier  forts.  The 
sea  surrounds  the  small  district  on  all  sides  except  on  the 
west,  where  the  narrow  Megarian  province  connects 
it  with  the  Isthmus  of  Corinth,  the  bridge  to  the 
Peloponnesus.  A  series  of  small  plains  is  formed  by 
the  mountain  spurs  projecting  to  the  south,  namely, 
the  plain  of  Eleusis  on  the  west,  the  plain  of  Athens 
with  its  two  small  streams,  the  Cephisus  and  the  Ilissus, 
the  Mesogaea  or  midland  plain  east  of  Hymettus,  and 
finally  a  fertile  stretch  along  the  eastern  and  north¬ 
eastern  coast.  The  total  area  available  for  cultivation 
was  small  indeed,  and  the  thin  soil,  while  favorable  to 
the  olive,  was  quite  inadequate  to  supply  the  inhab¬ 
itants  with  food  and  produce.  Although  the  available 
land  was  industriously  cultivated,  the  population  was 
compelled  for  support  to  turn  to  manufactures,  to  fish¬ 
ing,  and  commerce  on  the  sea.  Wheat  and  general 

17 


18 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


produce  were  imported  from  foreign  lands.  The  early 
inhabitants  of  Attica  may  therefore  be  differentiated 
thus  in  regard  to  place  of  habitation  and  occupation: 
the  people  of  the  mountains  were  shepherds,  those  of 
the  plain  were  farmers,  while  the  dwellers  by  the  sea 
were  seamen  or  fishers.  Originally,  we  are  told,  there 
were  twelve  independent  towns  in  Attica,  e.g.,  Eleusis, 
Marathon,  and  others,  but  Theseus,  mythical  hero- 
king,  joined  all  these  scattered  communities  into  one 
federation,  which  became  the  greatest  city-state, 
Athens.  In  consequence,  all  inhabitants  of  Attica  were 
citizens  of  Athens,  and  Athens  and  Attica  were  politi¬ 
cally  identical. 

Two  mountains  rise  near  Athens,  Pentelicus  and 
Hymettus.  Pentelicus  (Fig.  7),  some  3600  feet  in 
height,  lies  to  the  northeast  and  was,  and  still  is,  the 
source  of  an  admirable  marble  (Pentelic)  extensively 
used  for  building  purposes.  All  the  temples  of  the  city 
and  structures  on  the  Acropolis  were  built  of  this  ma¬ 
terial.  Pausanias,  the  ancient  Greek  traveler  of  the 
second  century  after  Christ,  who  wrote  the  valuable 
extant  guide-book  or  description  of  Greece,  tells  the 
story  that  the  building  of  the  Athenian  stadium  of  Pen¬ 
telic  marble  by  Herodes  Atticus  in  the  second  century 
a.d.  well-nigh  exhausted  the  quarries  of  the  mountain! 
But  in  recent  years  with  marble  from  this  same  source 
the  stadium  has  been  reclothed  and  many  buildings 
erected  and  a  mountain  of  marble  still  remains.  The 
traveler  by  sea  while  still  far  from  land  can  see  the 
great  white  gashes  and  scars  on  the  sides  of  Pentelicus 
where  the  quarrying  has  been  done.  It  was  truly  a 
great  boon  for  Athens  to  have  at  its  doors  this  source  of 
building  material.  There  is  considerable  iron  present  in 
Pentelic  marble  and  this  becomes  oxidized  by  exposure 
to  the  weather,  so  that  Athenian  ruins,  e.g.,  the  Par¬ 
thenon,  are  not  pure  white  but  have  assumed  a  golden 
brown  color  due  to  the  patina.  Immediately  to  the 
northeast  of  Pentelicus  lies  the  little  plain  of  Marathon, 
some  twenty-four  miles  from  Athens,  the  site  of  the 


Fig.  7.  Mt.  Pentelicus  from  the  S.  E. 


Fig.  8.  Marathon:  The  Burial-Mound 


Fig.  io.  Sunium:  The  Temple  of  Poseidon 


ATTICA  AND  ATHENS 


19 


critical  battle  in  490  b.c.,  when  the  Persian  host  met 
complete  defeat  at  the  hands  of  the  Athenian  defending 
army  under  Miltiades.  Over  the  Athenian  dead  was 
heaped  a  tumulus  ( soros )  (Fig.  8)  on  the  plain  which 
the  visitor  may  behold  today.  Recent  exploration  of 
this  mound  brought  to  light  vases  and  relics  of  those 
heroes,  the  men  of  Marathon. 

Separated  from  Pentelicus  by  an  interval  of  some  two 
miles  is  Hymettus  (Fig.  9),  3300  feet  in  height,  a  moun¬ 
tain  wall  some  twelve  miles  in  length  stretching  like  the 
back  of  a  great  whale  from  north  to  south.  It  is  a 
prominent  feature  of  the  Attic  landscape.  Particularly 
at  sunset  is  the  mountain  a  spectacle  of  beauty  as  the 
entranced  spectator  watches  upon  its  surface  as  upon  a 
great  screen  the  play  of  changing  colors,  the  pinkish, 
violet,  and  purple  glow,  as  Ovid  says,  purpureos  colies 
florentis  Hymetti.  Hymettus  was  renowned  for  its  bees 
and  delicious  honey,  antiquity’s  substitute  for  sugar, 
and  likewise  for  its  building  stone,  a  bluish  and  streaked 
marble:  the  reference  of  Horace  will  be  recalled,  non 
trabes  Hymettiae  (Odes  2.18.3).  This  stone  was  a 
special  favorite  in  Hellenistic  and  Roman  times. 

Attica  terminates  in  the  promontory  of  Sunium,  a 
narrow,  rocky,  and  lofty  height  on  which  from  afar  still 
shine  in  sunshine  and  gleam  in  moonlight  the  milk- 
white  columns  of  the  temple  of  Poseidon,  the  “  Su- 
nium’s  marble  steep  ”  of  Byron  (Fig.  10). 

Near  Sunium  were  the  silver  mines  of  Laurium,  an 
important  source  of  revenue  for  ancient  Athens  and 
even  today  still  worked  for  baser  metals. 

As  Athens  was  an  inland  town,  a  few  miles  distant 
from  the  sea,  a  harbor  was  necessary.  Originally  the 
open  bay  and  roadstead  of  Phalerum,  three  miles  away, 
had  sufficed,  but  in  the  fifth  century  a  safer  and  better 
maritime  haven  was  needed  and  this  was  found  at 
Piraeus.  Here,  through  the  efforts  of  Themistocles  and 
later  of  Pericles,  a  flourishing  ship-station  and  town 
arose.  In  fact,  after  the  destruction  of  Athens  by  the 
Persians  in  480  b.c.,  Themistocles  urged  the  Athenians 


20 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


to  move  their  city  to  Piraeus  for  greater  convenience  of 
commerce  and  prosperity.  But,  as  can  readily  be  im¬ 
agined,  the  Athenians,  profoundly  attached  to  the  Acro¬ 
polis,  a  site  so  ancient  and  revered,  refused.  The 
harbor  settlement  rapidly  grew  in  importance,  and  was 
largely  settled  by  traders  and  foreigners.  As  it  was  an 
essential  part  of  the  city  it  was  fortified  and  included 
in  the  circuit  of  the  Long  Walls,  which  united  and  pro¬ 
tected  both  Athens  and  its  port. 

Outside  the  harbor,  not  many  miles  distant  and 
plainly  visible,  lies  Aegina,  an  island  some  twenty-five 
miles  in  circumference,  and  a  powerful  Dorian  state 
in  the  sixth  century.  Rivalry  and  collision  with  the 
growing  power  of  Ionian  Athens  were  inevitable,  and 
this  “  eyesore  of  the1  Piraeus/’  as  Pericles  called  it,  was 
subjugated  by  Athens. 

Off  the  western  coast  of  Attica  is  the  island  Salamis, 
noted  for  the  momentous  sea-fight  in  480  b.c.,  be¬ 
tween  Greeks  and  Persians,  where  the  invading  host 
of  Xerxes  was  decisively  defeated  by  the  Greek  fleet 
under  Themistocles. 

Just  north  of  Salamis  on  the  bay  of  Eleusis  is  the 
town  of  the  same  name,  about  fourteen  miles  from 
Athens,  the  seat  of  the  cult  of  Demeter  and  Perseph¬ 
one  and  the  place  for  centuries  of  the  celebration 
of  the  Eleusinian  Mysteries.  Eleusis  has  been  thor¬ 
oughly  excavated  and  the  foundations  of  the  Hall  of 
Initiation  and  other  architectural  and  sculptural  re¬ 
mains  revealed. 

Journeying  to  Athens  from  Eleusis  over  the  Sacred 
Way,  the  traveler  crosses  the  Athenian  plain  and  the 
river  Cephisus,  which  waters  the  Attic  olive  orchards. 
The  Cephisus  ran  through  the  gardens  of  Plato’s  gym¬ 
nasium  (the  Academy)  and  fertilized  the  groves  of 
Colonus,  birthplace  of  Sophocles  and  last  refuge  of 
Oedipus  of  Thebes.  The  hill  of  Colonus,  called 
Colonus  Hippius  or  Horse  Knoll,  was  a  lovely  wooded 
spot  in  ancient  days  and  inspired  Sophocles  in  his 
play,  Oedipus  at  Colonus ,  to  celebrate  its  beauties 


% 


Fig.  12.  The  Areopagus  at  Athens 


ATTICA  AND  ATHENS 


21 


in  one  of  the  finest  lyrics  in  Greek  tragedy  (668  ff.). 
The  Sacred  Way  then  took  its  course  through  the 
outer  Cer amicus,  or  Potters’  Quarter,  a  district  which 
furnished  suitable  clay  for  the  makers  of  vases.  Here, 
too,  is  the  Street  of  Tombs,  marking  the  ancient 
burial-place.  Many  of  the  old  tombstones  have  been 
removed  to  the  Museum  in  Athens,  but  some  fine  ex¬ 
amples  of  Athenian  sepulchral  monuments  remain  in 


Fig.  13.  Plan  of  Ancient  Athens 


situ  (Fig.  n).  The  road  then  passed  through  a  gate, 
the  Dipylon,  into  the  Inner  Ceramicus,  and  then  into 
the  town  proper  and  into  the  Agora,  the  market  or 
meeting-place,  the  center  of  the  city’s  social,  commer¬ 
cial,  and  political  life. 

A  splendid  view  of  all  Athens  and  its  environs  is 
obtained  from  the  conspicuous  conical  hill  of  Mt. 
Lycabettus,  over  900  feet  in  height,  at  the  north¬ 
eastern  extremity  of  the  city.  This  prominent  fea¬ 
ture  of  the  Athenian  landscape  is  rarely  mentioned 
by  the  Athenian  writers  and  evidently  was  not  of  great 
religious  significance.  A  little  chapel  of  St.  George 
now  caps  its  summit,  while  at  its  base  to  the  southeast 


22 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


are  located  the  American  School  of  Classical  Studies 
and  the  British  School. 

The  center  of  dominating  interest  and  importance 
in  both  ancient  and  modern  Athens  is,  of  course,  the 
Acropolis  or  Citadel,  where  the  Athenians  in  early 
times  first  settled.  The  hill  of  the  Acropolis  is  a  flat- 
topped  rocky  plateau  about  1000  feet  long,  450  feet 
wide,  and  500  feet  high.  It  is  precipitous  on  all  sides 
except  the  western  and  was  made  more  inaccessible 
by  walls  of  masonry  (See  Frontispiece). 

Some  300  feet  northwest  of  the  Acropolis  lies  the 
Areopagus ,  a  rough  hill  of  considerable  surface  area, 
377  feet  in  height.  The  familiar  Biblical  name  of  the 
Areopagus  is  Mars’  Hill  (Hill  of  Ares),  where  Saint 
Paul  delivered  his  message  to  the  Athenians  (Fig.  12). 

To  the  west  of  the  Acropolis  lies  the  hill  called  the 
Pnyx ,  where  the  meetings  of  the  Ecclesia  (Assembly) 
were  early  held,  while  on  the  southeastern  slope  was 
the  sacred  precinct  of  the  god  Dionysus,  with  his 
temple  and  theater. 


CHAPTER  IV 

ARCHITECTURE  AND  THE  MONUMENTS  OF  ATHENS 

“  The  lesson  of  the  Parthenon  is  the  lesson  of  a  steadfast 
vision  of  beauty,  held  high  above  individual  effort  and  failure, 
realizing  itself  not  in  complex  detail  or  calculated  eccentricity, 
but  in  a  serene  and  exquisite  simplicity  of  form.  It  teaches  us 
that  in  the  arts  there  are  no  short  cuts,  and  that  anarchy,  the 
destruction  of  what  has  been  won  for  us  in  the  past,  is  not 
advance  but  the  straight  road  to  the  bottomless  pit  of  barba¬ 
rism.” —  R.  Blomfield. 

IT  seems  necessary  to  present  a  few  of  the  most  im¬ 
portant  facts  relative  to  Greek  architecture,  in 
order  that  the  nature,  appearance,  and  purpose  of 
the  buildings  and  monuments  of  Athens  may  be  more 
clearly  understood. 

In  building  materials  the  Athenians  were  fortunate. 
Limestone,  both  hard  and  soft  (the  latter  mostly  com¬ 
ing  from  Piraeus  and  called  poros ),  was  abundant,  and 
marble,  as  we  have  seen,  was  quarried  from  Mt.  Pen- 
telicus  and  in  later  times  from  Mt.  Hymettus.  From 
the  island  of  Paros  a  marble  of  coarser  but  glistening 
grain  was  obtained  which  was  used  extensively  in  sculp¬ 
ture;  the  Pentelic  marble  was  employed  for  the  great 
Periclean  buildings  of  the  fifth  century  b.c.  Rubble 
construction  was  often  used,  the  binding  material  being 
a  mortar  of  clay:  lime  mortar  is  of  Roman  origin. 
The  ordinary  house  or  wall  was  built  of  sun-dried  brick, 
which  might  be  covered  with  stucco,  resting  on  a  course 
or  foundation  of  stone-work.  Burnt  brick  when  found 
in  buildings  in  Greek  lands  is  of  Roman  date,  as  it  was 
not  used  by  the  Greeks,  although  burnt  tiles  were  em¬ 
ployed  for  roofing.  The  chief  woods  were  pine,  fir, 
oak,  and  ash,  but  timber  was  never  abundant  and  was 
used  economically. 


2  3 


24 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


The  Greek  temple  was  not  a  house  of  assembly  for 
the  purpose  of  worship,  but  originated  as  a  place  of 
residence  for  the  image  of  a  deity  and  for  the  protec¬ 
tion  of  religious  offerings.  The  earliest  Greek  temples 
may  have  been  made  of  wood  and  when  stone  was  used 
as  a  substitute  certain  architectural  forms  seem  to  have 
been  retained.  For  example,  many  scholars  think  that 
originally  the  stone  columns  were  tree-trunks,  the 
architraves  were  wooden  beams,  the  triglyphs  were  the 
ends  of  the  horizontal  beams,  the  regulae  were  wooden 
cleats,  and  the  guttae  were  wooden  dowels.  In  the 
construction  of  the  temple  the  structure  rested  on  a 
foundation  of  stone,  bed-rock  if  possible.  Then  came 
a  series  of  three  steps  of  which  the  top-step  was 
called  the  stylobate  or  pillar-step,  which  supported  the 
columns. 

In  Greek  architecture  we  find  three  orders,  the  Doric, 
the  Ionic,  and  the  Corinthian,  the  last-named  being  a 
variation  of  the  Ionic. 

In  the  Doric  order  the  rather  sturdy  pillar  rests  di¬ 
rectly  without  a  base  on  the  stylobate.  The  shaft  of 
the  pillar  is  generally  constructed  of  a  series  of  sections 
or  drums  bonded  together  and  is  channeled  usually 
with  twenty  channels  or  flutes  which  intersect  at  sharp 
angles.  The  diameter  is  somewhat  less  at  the  top  than 
at  the  bottom,  but  there  is  a  slightly  swelling  or  curv¬ 
ing  outline  of  the  shaft,  called  the  entasis.  The  Doric 
capital  consists  of  two  parts  —  a  lower  curved  portion 
or  cushion,  the  echinus,  and,  on  top  of  this,  a  square 
block,  the  abacus,  completing  the  capital.  Upon  the 
capital  rests  a  super-structure,  the  entablature,  which 
consists  of  architrave,  frieze,  and  cornice.  The  archi¬ 
trave  is  composed  of  the  squared  blocks,  which  reach 
from  column  to  column.  The  frieze  is  made  up  of 
alternating  triglyphs  and  metopes,  the  former  thus 
called  because  of  their  division  into  three  bands  by  two 
vertical  channels;  the  latter  being  the  interstices  or 
holes  between  the  triglyphs.  The  metopes  were  usually 
filled  by  stone  blocks,  sometimes  decorated  by  sculp- 


MONUMENTS  OF  ATHENS 


25 


ture.  Generally  there  is  one  triglyph  over  each  column 
and  over  each  intercolumniation.  Below  each  triglyph 
is  a  small  cleat,  the  regula ,  and  under  the  regula  are 


Ionic  (Erechtheum) 


Corinthian 

(Monument  of  Lysicrates) 


Fig.  14.  The  Three  Orders  of  Greek  Architecture 
(From  Stathan’s  Short  Critical  History  of  Architecture) 

six  guttae  (drops).  The  function  of  the  projecting 
cornice  above  the  frieze  was  to  throw  off  rain-water. 
The  cella ,  or  chamber  of  the  temple,  had  a  roof  of 


26 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


wood  and  rafters  covered  with  tiles  of  terra-cotta  or 
marble.  The  triangular  gable  or  pediment  thus  formed 
at  either  end  might  contain  sculpture. 

The  Ionic  order  differs  from  the  Doric  in  that  the 
Ionic  column  has  a  base  consisting  generally  of  an 
upper  and  lower  convex  torus  separated  by  a  concave 
trochilus .  The  shaft  is  more  slender  than  the  Doric 
and  the  twenty-four  channels  do  not  intersect,  but 
each  channel  is  separated  from  the  other  by  a  narrow 
flat  surface.  The  capital  has  a  volute  or  roll  on 
either  side  and  between  these  is  a  pattern,  the  so- 
called  egg-and-dart  ornament.  Above  the  Ionic  cap¬ 
ital  is  an  entablature,  having  an  architrave  which  may 
be  divided  into  two  or  three  slightly  projecting  bands 
{fasciae).  Above  this  the  frieze  is  continuous  (i.e., 
without  metopes  and  triglyphs)  and  may  be  orna¬ 
mented  above  with  carved  members.  Characteristic 
of  the  Ionic  order  are  the  dentils ,  a  row  of  projecting 
tooth-like  ornaments,  just  below  the  cornice.  In  the 
Attic-Ionic  style  the  frieze  may  be  decorated  with  a 
continuous  band  of  sculpture  in  relief  and,  in  this 
event,  there  are  no  dentils. 

The  Corinthian  order  is  the  same  as  the  Ionic  ex¬ 
cept  that  its  capital  is  composed  of  an  ornamental 
design  of  acanthus  leaves.  Vitruvius,  the  Roman  archi¬ 
tect,  says  that  the  Corinthian  capital  was  suggested 
to  Callimachus  when  he  observed  an  acanthus  plant 
entwined  about  a  basket  of  sepulchral  offerings.  In 
general  it  may  be  said  that  the  Doric  order  gives  an 
impression  of  simplicity,  strength,  and  solidity,  par¬ 
ticularly  in  its  earlier  examples;  the  Ionic,  of  slender¬ 
ness  and  grace;  the  Corinthian,  of  richness  and 
ornamentation.  The  Corinthian  was  of  comparatively 
late  origin;  the  earliest  example  of  its  use  in  Athens 
is  in  the  Monument  of  Lysicrates  335  b.c.  Later, 
as  taste  declined,  it  became  very  popular  and  was  a 
favorite  of  the  Romans. 

It  still  comes  as  a  surprise  to  many  persons  to  learn 
that  color  was  extensively  used  on  Greek  marble 


MONUMENTS  OF  ATHENS 


27 


temples  and  sculpture.  The  exact  extent  of  the  ap¬ 
plication  of  this  polychromy  is  uncertain,  but  certainly 
red  and  dark-blue  and  occasionally  yellow,  green,  and 
gilt  were  employed.  Triglyphs  and  regulae  were  blue, 
guttae  red.  Likewise  the  background  of  sculptured 
metopes  was  red  and  moldings  tinted.  In  the  pedi¬ 
ments,  backgrounds  of  sculpture  were  painted  red  or 
blue.  The  statues  might  be  colored  as  to  borders  of 
draperies,  eyes,  lips,  and  hair.  Several  statues  un¬ 
earthed  in  excavations  on  the  Acropolis  still  show  the 
colors  bright  and  fresh.  In  the  brilliant  sunshine 
and  clear  atmosphere  of  Greece  some  touches  of  color 
on  the  milk-white  marbles  were  doubtless  highly  effec¬ 
tive.  At  any  rate  we  may  be  sure  that  the  beauty  of 
these  works  of  art  was  only  enhanced  and  in  no  wise 
diminished  by  the  use  of  color  as  applied  by  the 
original  artists. 

The  cella,  or  interior  of  the  temple,  was  lighted  usu¬ 
ally  only  by  the  large  eastern  entrance  doors.  Bright 
illumination  of  the  interior  was  not  needed  or  desired. 
Lamps,  of  course,  could  be  used  when  necessary.  The 
Erechtheum,  however,  had  windows. 

Athens  before  the  Persian  Wars  was  a  town  of  plain 
appearance.  It  is  true  that  the  tyrant  Pisistratus  and 
his  family,  even  in  the  sixth  century  b.c.,  began  to 
adorn  the  city.  The  temple  of  Olympian  Zeus  was 
begun  by  Pisistratus,  who  also  introduced  the  water 
supply  from  Hymettus  for  the  Fountain  of  Nine 
Spouts,  the  Enneacrunus.  The  Acropolis  was  not  neg¬ 
lected  by  the  sons  of  Pisistratus,  who  added  to  its 
walls  and  constructed  upon  it  buildings  ornamented 
with  sculptures.  The  early  embellishment  of  the  city, 
however,  was  rudely  halted  and  in  fact  entirely  de¬ 
stroyed  by  the  Persian  occupation  of  the  city  and 
Acropolis  in  480  b.c.,  when  the  army  of  Xerxes 
brutally  demolished  and  burned  temples,  walls,  houses, 
and  statues.  Immediately  after  the  departure  of  the 
invaders,  who  had  suffered  defeat  at  Salamis,  the 
Athenians  devoted  themselves  with  great  energy  to 


28 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


the  work  of  rebuilding.  This  work,  begun  under 
Themistocles,  made  progress  under  Cimon,  but 
reached  a  glorious  climax  under  Pericles  in  the  latter 
half  of  the  fifth  century  b.c.,  when  numerous  marble 
temples  adorned  with  sculptures  were  constructed. 
The  enormous  expense  of  these  building  operations 
was  largely  defrayed  from  the  funds  of  the  Delian 
Confederacy,  that  confederation  of  states  which  had 
been  formed  after  the  Persian  Wars,  with  Athens  at 
its  head,  to  insure  protection  against  future  attacks 
from  the  barbarians.  Earthquakes,  vandalism,  shell¬ 
fire  and  explosions  of  gun-powder  have  wrought  dur¬ 
ing  the  centuries  grave  injury  to  these  wonderful 
examples  of  architecture,  but  there  remain  still  in 
existence  today  ruined  buildings  of  impressive  beauty 
and  perfection.  These  monuments  of  Athena’s  city 
we  shall  now  describe,  first,  those  outside  the  Acro¬ 
polis;  next,  the  buildings  on  the  sacred  citadel. 

Northwest  of  the  Acropolis  and  bounding  the  Agora 
on  the  west  stands  one  of  the  two  best  preserved  Greek 
temples  in  existence,  the  so-called  Theseum  (temple  of 
Theseus)  (Fig.  15).  Scholars  generally  believe  that 
this  temple  was  built  in  honor  of  Hephaestus  and  should 
therefore  be  called  the  Hephaesteum.  It  is  a  Doric 
temple,  45  feet  wide  and  104  feet  long,  built  mostly  of 
Pentelic  marble.  It  is  hexastyle  (i.e.,  it  has  six  pillars 
at  either  end)  and  peripteral  (i.e.,  has  a  continuous 
colonnade  or  peristyle  on  all  four  sides).  Thirteen 
columns  are  on  either  side.  The  pedimental  groups 
have  disappeared.  A  few  sculptured  metopes  badly 
damaged  remain ;  these  represent  the  labors  of  Heracles 
and  the  deeds  of  Theseus.  The  date  of  the  temple  is 
uncertain,  although  undoubtedly  it  is  but  little  later 
than  the  Parthenon.  Its  excellent  preservation  is  partly 
to  be  accounted  for  by  the  fact  that  in  Byzantine  times 
it  was  used  as  a  Christian  church  dedicated  to  St. 
George. 

Southeast  of  the  Acropolis  the  visitor  today  in  Athens 
observes  a  group  of  colossal  Corinthian  columns,  the 


Fig.  15. 


The  Theseum  (so-called)  at  Athens 


Fig.  16.  The  Monument  of  Lysicrates,  Athens 


Fig.  17.  The  Temple  of  “Wingless  Victory,”  Athens 


Fig.  18.  The  Propylaea  (Entrance  Portal),  from  the  E. 


MONUMENTS  OF  ATHENS 


29 


ruins  of  the  temple  of  Olympian  Zeus,  the  Olympieum 
(Fig.  19),  the  largest  of  all  Greek  temples.  As 
the  case  with  some  of  the  Gothic  cathedrals  this  tem¬ 
ple  was  under  intermittent  construction  for  centuries. 
It  was  begun  by  Pisistratus  about  503  b.c.,  and  was 
probably  intended  to  be  of  the  Doric  order  of  archi¬ 
tecture.  Remaining  incomplete  at  the  death  of  the 
tyrant  it  apparently  was  untouched  until  about  174  b.c. 
when  Antiochus  Epiphanes,  king  of  Syria,  advanced 
the  work,  but  increased  the  proportions  of  the  building 
and  changed  the  order  of  architecture  to  the  Corin¬ 
thian,  the  prevailing  mode  in  his  day.  We  learn  that 
in  86  b.c.  Sulla  carried  off  some  of  the  columns,  per¬ 
haps  these  of  the  cella,  to  Rome  for  the  Capitoline 
temple  to  Jupiter.  It  remained  for  the  emperor  Ha¬ 
drian,  a  lover  and  benefactor  of  Athens,  to  finish  the 
temple  in  130  a.d.  The  proportions  of  the  Olympieum 
were  enormous.  It  measured  354  by  135  feet  and 
was  over  90  feet  in  height,  having  eight  Corinthian 
columns  at  either  end  and  twenty  columns  along  the 
sides.  The  temple  was  dipteral,  i.e.,  a  double  row  of 
columns  entirety  surrounded  the  cella.  The  great  size 
of  the  columns  (56.6  feet)  may  be  judged  by  com¬ 
paring  them  with  those  of  the  Parthenon  (34-j  feet). 
Nothing  is  known  of  the  sculptures  of  the  temple, 
except  that  in  the  cella  there  seems  to  have  been  a 
great  gold  and  ivory  statue  of  Zeus. 

A  short  distance  to  the  east  of  the  Olympieum,  in 
a  dip  between  two  hills,  lies  the  Stadium,  where  the 
Panathenaic  Games  were  held.  The  Stadium  in  its 
finished  form  is  of  the  time  of  the  orator  Lycurgus 
who,  in  330  b.c.,  supervised  its  construction.  Origin¬ 
ally  there  were  no  seats,  the  spectators  sitting  on  the 
sloping  hillsides.  In  140  b.c.  the  Stadium  was  clothed 
in  Pentelic  marble  at  the  expense  of  the  wealthy 
Herodes  Atticus,  benefactor  of  Athens,  who  likewise 
built  the  Odeum,  still  an  imposing  Roman  structure 
at  the  southwestern  corner  of  the  Acropolis.  More 
than  50,000  spectators  could  be  seated  in  the  Sta- 


30 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


dium.  The  course  proper  was  600  feet  in  length.  In 
recent  years  the  Stadium  has  been  built  in  Pentelic 
marble  and  appropriately  served  as  the  scene  of  the  first 
celebration  of  the  revived  Olympian  Games  (Fig.  20). 

Around  the  southeastern  and  eastern  slopes  of  the 
Acropolis,  beginning  at  the  theater  of  Dionysus,  ran 
a  road  called  the  Street  of  Tripods ,  so  called  because 
of  a  series  of  small  supports  of  tripods  which  were 
erected  along  the  thoroughfare.  One  of  these  struc¬ 
tures  has  been  preserved  in  the  attractive  little  Mon¬ 
ument  of  Lysicrates  (Fig.  16),  erected  in  335  b.c,  by 
Lysicrates,  a  wealthy  Athenian  citizen,  who  had  been  a 
victorious  choregus  in  a  contest  of  dithyrambic  choruses. 
This  well-preserved  Monument,  which  served  as  a  basis 
for  the  prize  awarded  him,  a  bronze  tripod,  is  itself  of 
great  interest  and  charm  and  is  likewise  of  importance 
as  being  the  earliest  example  of  the  Corinthian  order 
in  Athens.  On  a  base  of  poros  about  thirteen  feet 
high  rests  a  circular  shrine  of  Pentelic  marble,  some 
twenty  feet  in  height  and  about  seven  feet  in  diameter. 
This  is  constructed  of  six  fluted  columns  and  between 
these  are  curved  marble  slabs.  On  the  columns  is  an 
architrave,  and  a  frieze  some  ten  inches  high,  which 
portrays  the  punishment  of  the  pirates  who  were 
metamorphosed  into  dolphins  by  Dionysus  —  a  theme 
which  finds  literary  expression  in  the  charming  Hymn 
to  Dionysus .  The  roof  represents  a  thatch  of  laurel 
leaves  and  from  its  center  arose  a  floral  ornament, 
which  supported  the  bronze  tripod.  This  little  build¬ 
ing  was  formerly  called  the  Lantern  of  Demosthenes 
and  an  absurd  story  related  that  the  great  orator  used 
it  as  a  study!  An  excellent  reproduction  of  the  Monu¬ 
ment  of  Lysicrates  is  on  exhibition  at  the  Metropol¬ 
itan  Museum  in  New  York  City.  The  structure  itself 
has  served  as  inspiration  for  many  monuments. 

The  Theater  of  Dionysus  (Fig.  46)  on  the  south¬ 
eastern  slope  of  the  Acropolis  will  be  discussed  in  the 
chapter  devoted  to  the  Greek  theater. 

The  impressive  monuments  on  the  Acropolis  now 


Fig.  19.  The  Olympieum  (Temple  of  Olympian  Zeus) 


Fig.  20.  The  Ancient  Stadium  (restored),  at  Athens 


MONUMENTS  OF  ATHENS 


31 


claim  our  attention.  These  magnificent  marble  build¬ 
ings  of  the  latter  part  of  the  fifth  century  b.c.  all  owe 
their  existence  to  the  initiative  of  the  statesman  Per¬ 
icles  and  were  erected  in  honor  of  the  protecting 
deities  of  Athens  and  for  the  glory  and  adornment 
of  Athens.  As  has  been  said,  their  great  cost  in  large 
measure  was  defrayed  from  the  funds  in  the  treasury 
of  the  Delian  Confederacy,  that  naval  league  or  rather 
empire  of  which  Athens  had  become  the  dominating 
mistress  and  Athena  the  patron  goddess.  The  success¬ 
ful  construction  of  these  noble  monuments,  however, 


so  too  wo  300  400  500  Feet. 


Fig.  2i.  Plan  of  the  Acropolis 
(From  Weller,  Athens  and  Its  Monuments) 

was  due  to  the  genius  of  such  great  architects  as  Ictinus, 
Mnesicles,  and  Callicrates,  the  sculptor  Phidias,  and 
the  painter  Polygnotus.  But  the  lofty  conceptions  of 
these  artists  were  brought  to  glorious  materialization 
by  the  intelligent  and  conscientious  labor  of  the  Athen¬ 
ian  workman,  both  freeman  and  slave.  The  materials 
used  and  the  workers  employed  are  vividly  described 
by  Plutarch  ( Life  of  Pericles ,  ch.  12,  trans.  by  B. 
Perrin):  “The  materials  to  be  used  were  stone, 
bronze,  ivory,  gold,  ebony,  and  cypress-wood;  the  arts 
which  should  elaborate  and  work  up  these  materials 
were  those  of  carpenter,  moulder,  bronze-smith,  stone¬ 
cutter,  dyer,  worker  in  gold  and  ivory,  painter,  em- 


32 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


broiderer,  embosser,  to  say  nothing  of  the  forwarders 
and  furnishers  of  the  material,  such  as  factors,  sailors 
and  pilots  by  sea,  and,  by  land,  wagon-makers,  trainers 
of  yoked  beasts  and  drivers.  There  were  also  rope- 
makers,  weavers,  leather-workers,  road-builders,  and 
miners.” 

As  one  ascends  the  western  slope  of  the  Citadel 
and  before  he  enters  the  Propylaea  he  sees  on  the  right 
a  beautiful  little  building,  the  temple  of  Nike  Apteros 
or  Wingless  Victory ,  thus  called  as  it  was  built  in 
honor  of  Athena  as  goddess  of  Victory,  whereas  Vic¬ 
tory  was  usually  personified  as  a  winged  figure,  e.g., 
the  famous  Victory  of  Samothrace.  The  temple  of 
Wingless  Victory,  of  about  the  same  date  as  the 
Parthenon,  is  of  small  proportions,  the  dimensions  of 
the  cella  being  only  some  twelve  by  fourteen  feet  and 
the  columns  not  quite  thirteen  and  a  half  feet  in 
height.  It  is  built  of  Pentelic  marble,  of  the  Ionic 
order,  with  four  columns  at  front  and  four  at  back. 
A  sculptured  frieze,  eighteen  inches  high,  somewhat 
damaged,  runs  around  the  building.  The  space  in 
front  and  about  the  temple  was  enclosed  by  a  sculp¬ 
tured  marble  balustrade  or  parapet;  slabs  from  this 
balustrade  representing  winged  Victories  are  preserved 
and  are  especially  admired  because  of  the  beauty  of 
the  figures  and  the  execution  of  the  drapery.  The 
story  of  the  disappearance  and  the  resurrection  of  this 
charming  little  temple  is  indeed  interesting.  In  1676 
it  was  still  standing,  as  a  traveler  reports.  A  little 
later  the  building  was  pulled  down  by  the  Turks  and 
was  used  by  them  to  build  an  emplacement  for  cannon. 
This  battery  was  removed  in  1835  and  the  little 
temple  was  rebuilt  on  the  spot  from  its  disjecta 
membra  (Fig  17) . 

The  entrance  proper  to  the  Citadel  or  Acropolis  was 
guarded  and  adorned  by  a  splendid  structure  of  Pen¬ 
telic  marble,  the  Propylaea ,  or  Entrance  Gates  (Fig. 
18),  which  was  built  under  Pericles  by  the  architect 
Mnesicles.  '  This  building  was  begun  in  437  b.c.  and 


MONUMENTS  OF  ATHENS 


33 


construction  ended  in  432  b.c.  after  the  sum  of  2012 
talents  (over  $2,000,000)  had  been  expended.  The 
Propylaea  consisted  of  a  portal  with  five  doorways,  and 
porticoes  in  front  and  behind,  and  the  plans  called  for 
two  wings.  In  the  western  portico  a  combination  of 
Doric  and  Ionic  columns  was  effectively  employed.  The 
northwest  wing,  a  chamber  lighted  by  a  door  and  two 
windows,  fronted  by  three  Doric  columns,  is  designated 
the  Pinakotheke  (picture-gallery),  as  here  paintings 
(described  by  Pausanias)  were  exhibited.  The  south¬ 
west  wing  of  the  Propylaea  as  originally  planned  was 
never  built,  as  its  construction  would  have  encroached 
upon  the  precinct  of  the  temple  of  Wingless  Victory. 

The  visitor,  having  passed  through  the  Propylaea, 
stands  upon  the  flat  top  of  the  Acropolis  and  beholds 
two  temples,  on  his  right  the  Parthenon  and  on  the 
left  the  Erechtheum.  The  foreground  is  littered  with 
a  wilderness  of  prostrate  stones,  blocks,  and  bases 
which  testify  to  the  numerous  statues  and  shrines  that 
once  stood  there.  It  was  halfway  between  the  Propy¬ 
laea  and  the  Erechtheum  that  the  huge  bronze  statue 
of  Athena  Promachos  (the  Champion)  by  Phidias 
stood.  With  shield,  spear,  and  crested  helmet  it  stood 
some  twenty-five  or  thirty  feet  in  height,  and  Pau¬ 
sanias  tells  us  that  “  the  head  of  the  spear  and  the 
crest  of  the  helmet  of  this  Athena  are  visible  as  you 
sail  up  from  the  direction  of  Sunium.” 

The  Erechtheum  (Fig.  24)  is  an  Ionic  temple  of  great 
beauty  and  interest.  Its  unique  design  is  probably  due 
to  the  fact  that  it  was  built  over  sacred  shrines  and 
tokens  of  Erechtheus  (mythical  hero  of  Athens), 
Athena,  and  Poseidon.  Its  dimensions  are  some  74  by 
37  feet.  There  are  three  porticoes  or  porches,  one  at 
the  eastern  end  fronted  by  six  Ionic  columns,  one  at  the 
northwest  corner  with  beautiful  coffered  ceiling  and 
ornamented  doorway,  and,  on  the  south,  the  famous 
Porch  of  the  Maidens  or  Caryatids.  This  last  porch  has, 
instead  of  columns,  six  statues  of  maidens  who  support 
on  their  heads  the  roof  of  the  portico.  The  figures 


34  GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 

stand  on  a  parapet  about  six  feet  high  and  are  in  their 
proportions  one  half  larger  than  life  size.  A  remark¬ 
able  effect  of  grace  and  dignity  is  given  and  there  is 
no  impression  of  strain  because  of  the  success  of  the 
sculptor  in  arranging  the  pose,  with  bent  knee,  the 
drapery  columnar  in  effect,  and  the  arrangement  of 
masses  of  hair  on  the  neck.  Furthermore,  the  super¬ 
structure  seems  of  light  weight,  as  no  frieze  rests  upon 
the  architrave.  One  of  the  Caryatids  is  now  in  the 
Lord  Elgin  collection  of  Greek  marbles  from  the 
Acropolis  in  the  British  Museum  and  for  this  missing 
figure  there  has  been  substituted  a  replica  of  terra¬ 
cotta.  The  Erechtheum  was  not  entirely  complete  in 
409  B.C. 

Our  discussion  of  the  most  important  monuments  of 
Athens  appropriately  ends  with  a  description  of  the 
chief  architectural  glory  of  Athens  and  the  world’s  most 
famous  building,  the  Parthenon  (Fig.  22).  This  temple 
was  built  in  honor  of  Athena  Parthenos  (the  Virgin 
Athena,  hence  the  name,  Parthenon)  and  took  the 
place  of  an  earlier  temple  destroyed  by  the  Persians  in 
480  b.c.  It  was  begun  by  Pericles  in  447  b.c.  and 
completed  in  432  b.c.  The  architects  were  Ictinus 
and  Callicrates,  and  the  superintendent  of  sculptures, 
Phidias.  This  peripteral  temple  of  Pentelic  marble 
is  a  perfect  example  of  the  Doric  order  and  has  eight 
columns  at  the  ends  and  seventeen  on  each  side.  The 
columns  are  a  little  over  34  feet  in  height  and  are  built 
up  of  twelve  drums.  One  entering  the  temple  first 
passed  through  the  east  portico  or  vestibule,  the 
Pronaos,  then  the  great  east  room  or  cella  proper, 
which  was  called,  because  of  its  length,  the  Hekatom- 
pedos  Neds  or  Hundred-foot  Temple1.  This  room  con¬ 
tained  the  celebrated  chryselephantine  (gold-and- 
ivory)  cult  statue  of  Athena,  the  work  of  Phidias. 
Back  of  this  room,  but  separated  from  it  by  a  wall,  was 
the  Parthenon  proper,  which  was  used  as  a  store-house 
for  the  treasures  of  the  goddess.  Finally  there  was 


MONUMENTS  OF  ATHENS 


35 


the  west  portico,  designated  the  Opisthodomos,  or 
Rear-chamber. 

The  Parthenon  is  not  merely  admirable  for  its  im¬ 
pressive  and  perfect  proportions  and  its  architectural 
beauty  and  finish,  but  is  no  less  remarkable  for  the 
wealth  of  its  sculptural  adornment.  The  eastern 
pediment  contained  a  group  representing  the  birth  of 
Athena;  the  western  portrayed  the  contest  between 
Athena  and  Poseidon  for  the  land  of  Attica.  A  number 
of  these  splendid  statues  have  been  preserved  and  are 
in  the  British  Museum.  The  metopes  of  the  building, 
about  four  feet  square,  ninety-two  in  number,  were 
sculptured;  of  these,  fifteen  are  likewise  in  London. 
A  beautiful  feature  of  the  decorative  sculptures  was 
the  Ionic  frieze,  some  524  feet  in  length  and  three  and 
a  quarter  feet  in  height,  which  was  placed  about  forty 
feet  above  the  floor  of  the  outer  corridor  and  ran  en¬ 
tirely  around  the  temple.  This  frieze,  carved  in  relief, 
containing  many  hundreds  of  figures,  represents  the 
Panathenaic  procession,  which  occurred  every  four 
years  on  the  occasion  of  the  great  festival.  Then  it 
was  that  the  peplos,  or  robe  of  Athena,  which  had 
been  woven  by  chosen  maidens  of  Athens,  was  carried 
to  the  Acropolis  for  presentation  to  the  goddess.  In 
the  procession  we  see  the  young  knights  on  their 
prancing  steeds,  chariots,  lyre-players,  worshippers 
with  offerings,  the  animals  destined  for  sacrifice,  and 
the  august  deities  themselves.  About  247  feet  of  this 
wonderful  frieze  are  among  the  Elgin  treasures  in  the 
British  Museum. 

The  later  history  of  the  Parthenon  is  of  interest. 
Surviving  the  Hellenistic  and  Roman  periods  it  was 
seen  in  the  second  century  a.d.  by  the  traveler  Pau- 
sanias.  In  the  fifth  century  a.d.  it  was  used  as  a 
Christian  church,  first  sacred  to  “  Holy  Wisdom,” 
later  to  the  “  Mother  of  God.”  Certain  alterations 
were  effected,  namely,  an  apse,  a  gallery,  windows, 
and  wall-paintings.  When  the  Turks  took  Athens 
about  1456  the  Parthenon  became  a  mosque  with  a 


36 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


high  minaret  at  the  southwest  corner!  In  1687  the 
whole  middle  portion  of  the  temple  was  blown  out 
by  an  explosion  of  powder  stored  there  by  the  Turks, 
who  were  being  besieged  by  the  Venetians.  It  was  in 
1801  that  Lord  Elgin,  by  the  permission  of  the  Turkish 
authorities,  removed  to  London  the  sculptured  treas¬ 
ures  above  described,  thereby  possibly  saving  them 
from  further  mutilation  or  even  destruction  and  mak¬ 
ing  them  accessible  to  western  Europe. 

Plutarch  ( Life  of  Pericles ,  ch.  12,  trans.  by  B. 
Perrin)  gives  us  a  striking  account  of  the  rapid  con¬ 
struction  of  the  Periclean  buildings:  ‘  So  then  the 
works  arose,  no  less  towering  in  their  grandeur  than 
inimitable  in  the  grace  of  their  outlines,  since  the  work¬ 
men  eagerly  strove  to  surpass  themselves  in  the  beauty 
of  their  handicraft.  And  yet  the  most  wonderful 
thing  about  them  was  the  speed  with  which  they  rose. 
Each  one  of  them,  men  thought,  would  require  many 
successive  generations  to  complete  it,  but  all  of  them 
were  fully  completed  in  the  heyday  of  a  single  admin¬ 
istration.” 

What  the  Greeks  accomplished  in  architecture  has 
been  always  admired.  It  is  true  that  Gothic  art  of  the 
twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries,  as  perfected  by  the 
builders  of  the  great  cathedrals  of  Europe,  is  one  of  the 
most  striking  evidences  of  human  achievement,  when 
the  feeble  hand  of  man  was  given  gigantic  powers  of 
accomplishment  by  the  urge  of  the  spirit  and  the  will 
to  create.  The  modern  “  sky-scraper  ”  is  a  worthy 
product  of  modern  needs  and  of  practical  commercial 
utility.  And  it  is  more  than  this.  The  Woolworth 
Building  in  New  York  City,  for  example,  an  impres¬ 
sive  structure  of  awe-inspiring  height  and  actual 
beauty  of  line,  form,  and  mass,  is  worthy  of  compari¬ 
son  with  the  great  architectural  achievements  of  the 
past.  But  Greek  architecture  will  ever  remain  as  one 
of  the  chief  sources  of  architectural  inspiration  by 
reason  of  its  simplicity,  its  sincerity,  its  conscientious 
working  out  of  legitimate  detail,  and  its  devotion  to 
severe  beauty  of  form. 


Fig.  22.  The  Parthenon 


Fig.  23.  The  Parthenon,  Reconstructed  at  Nashville,  Tenn. 

(From  Art  and  Archaeology ) 


Fig.  24.  The  Erechtheum 


Amphora  Hydria 

Fig.  25  Shapes  of  Athenian  Black-figured  Vases  (Metropolitan  Museum) 


CHAPTER  V 

HOUSE,  FURNITURE,  AND  VASES 

GREEK  houses  of  the  classical  period  were  built 
of  perishable  materials  and  consequently  ex¬ 
cavations  have  failed  to  reveal  to  us  much 
direct  evidence  relative  to  the  private  dwellings  of 
Athenians  of  that  time.  Furthermore,  the  modern 
city  of  Athens  is  built  on  the  ancient  site  and  excava¬ 
tion  is  therefore  difficult.  It  is  true  that  in  various 
parts  of  the  Greek  world,  as  at  the  island  of  Delos  and 
Priene  in  Asia  Minor,  Greek  dwellings  have  been  un¬ 
earthed,  but  these  are  of  rather  late  date  and  show 
marked  Roman  influence.  We  are  dependent,  there¬ 
fore,  largely  upon  references  in  the  literature.  These 
acquaint  us  with  the  general  characteristics  of  the 
Greek  house  but  chance  allusions  naturally  Tail  to 
give  us  detailed  information.  Although  in  Athenian 
houses  a  general  plan  of  building  and  arrangement 
was  followed,  variations  of  course  existed.  The  de¬ 
scription  given  below  must  be  prefaced  with  a  few 
important  considerations. 

The  private  house  was  not  so  important  to  the  Greek 
as  it  is  to  us,  for  the  reason  that  he  spent  as  little  time 
as  possible  in  it.  A  mild  climate  and  keen  interest 
in  social  and  public  life  and  happenings  allowed  and 
influenced  him  to  spend  most  of  his  waking  hours  out¬ 
doors.  At  home  the  life  of  the  family  centered  in  and 
about  the  court-yard  and  early  to  bed  and  early  rising 
were  universal  habits.  In  consequence  of  the  com¬ 
parative  unimportance  of  the  dwelling,  the  architec¬ 
ture  of  private  houses  was  neglected.  Expense  and 
labor  were  lavished  on  the  beautiful  public  buildings 
and  temples,  while  the  building  of  a  pretentious  house 

37 


38 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


was  considered  bad  taste  in  the  extreme.  Ancient 
writers  tell  us  that  the  private  houses  of  prominent 
and  wealthy  citizens  were  not  more  splendid  than  those 
of  their  neighbors  and  that  most  of  the  houses  of 
Athens  were  so  plain  that  the  stranger  could  scarcely 
realize  that  he  was  in  celebrated  Athens. 

As  to  the  price  of  houses,  we  learn  from  the  orator 
Isaeus  that  a  house  at  Melite  sold  for  half  a  talent 
(30  minaey  about  $540).  A  house  at  Eleusis  was 
worth  only  five  minae  (about  $90).  xAnother  city 
dwelling  sold  for  fifty  minae  ($900).  It  was  possible 
to  rent  a  modest  house  for  three  minae  ($54)  a  year. 
Socrates  says  that  he  could  sell  his  house  and  all  his 
other  property  for  perhaps  five  minae.  But  Socrates 
was  poor  in  the  goods  of  this  world.  In  estimating 
these  sums  allowance  must  be  made  for  the  great  differ¬ 
ence  in  purchasing  power  of  money.  We  should,  there¬ 
fore,  multiply  the  figures  presented  above  by  at  least 
five.  Even  so,  the  modern  tenant  has  good  cause  to 
envy  the  Athenian  as  a  householder. 

The  foundation  of  the  private  house  was  of  rough 
stone,  while  the  walls  were  constructed  of  sun-dried 
brick.  Such  a  wall  was  necessarily  rather  soft  and 
we  read  that  burglars  might  easily  enter  a  house  by 
digging  their  way  through  with  a  pick-axe;  hence 
the  Greek  word  for  burglar  signifies  “  wall-digger.” 

The  wall  of  sun-dried  brick  was  covered  with  a  coat¬ 
ing  of  stucco  or  plaster  of  lime,  which  might  be  tinted. 
The  flat  roof  of  the  city  house  was  covered  with  clay 
tiles.  The  house  was  built  directly  upon  the  street 
and  the  wall  presented  a  blank  surface  except  for  the 
small  windows  which  sometimes  gave  light  to  the 
second  story. 

The  most  essential  feature  of  the  Greek  house  was 
the  rectangular,  central,  open  court  or  aule  (aula), 
often  with  pillared  cloister,  surrounded  by  chambers. 
In  the  middle  of  the  court  were  an  altar  of  Zeus,  pro¬ 
tector  of  the  family,  and  statues  of  Zeus  and  Apollo. 
The  rooms  (living-room,  sleeping-room,  store-closets, 


HOUSE,  FURNITURE,  AND  VASES 


39 


etc.)  opening  off  the  court  might  be  few  or  many  and 
were  provided  with  doors  or  with  portieres.  Be¬ 
sides  the  front  street-door  a  second  entrance  at  the 
back  might  be  provided.  A  second  story,  often  used 
for  the  women’s  apartments,  was  usual.  The  entrance 
was  by  simple  stairs  of  wood. 

Heating  was  little  needed  and  was  primitive:  port¬ 
able  braziers  for  charcoal  were  common  and  an  open 
hearth  might  find  place  in  the  living-room.  Illumina¬ 
tion  at  night  was  effected  by  lamps,  with  wick  of  flax 
and  burning  olive-oil,  or  by  torches.  By  day  the  rooms 
were  lighted  from  the  court  and  those  of  the  second 
story  to  some  extent  by  the  small  windows  which  were 
protected  by  some  sort  of  shutters,  as  window-glass 
was  not  used  until  Roman  times. 

The  floors,  originally  of  hard-packed  earth,  were  later 
of  cement  and  finally  of  mosaic.  Mats  and  floor-cover¬ 
ings  might  be  employed.  The  walls  inside  were  white¬ 
washed  or  stuccoed,  and  in  finer  homes  of  the  later 
period  decorated  with  wall  paintings. 

Some  houses  had  cellars  where  huge  jars  containing 
wine,  oil,  and  provisions  were  stored.  Cisterns  were 
general  and  necessary  for  collecting  and  storing  rain¬ 
water.  Fresh  water  was  procured  daily  from  springs. 
A  common  scene  pictured  on  the  vases  is  that  of  a 
woman  getting  water  at  the  fountain  and  descriptions 
of  this  task  are  extremely  frequent  in  the  literature. 

As  we  have  seen,  unostentation  was  the  rule  in  the 
building  of  private  houses.  Gradually  greater  comfort 
was  effected  and  even  luxurious  features  were  intro¬ 
duced  by  the  wealthy.  Demosthenes  complains  that 
private  houses  in  his  time  are  beginning  to  surpass  pub¬ 
lic  buildings  in  magnificence.  Alcibiades  had  aroused 
adverse  criticism  by  having  the  walls  of  his  house 
decorated  with  paintings.  This  fashion,  in  later  times, 
became  prevalent.  In  the  Greek  house  of  the  island  of 
Delos  (second  century  b.c.)  and  at  Priene  (third  cen¬ 
tury  b.c.)  we  find  many  magnificent  details,  such  as 
elaborate  mosaics,  mural  decorations,  marble  moldings 


40  GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 

and  cornices,  tinted  stucco  ornaments,  and  handsome 
columns. 

Extreme  simplicity  likewise  characterized  the  furni¬ 
ture  and  furnishings  of  the  Athenian  dwelling.  As  has 
been  said,  the  Greeks  lived  out  of  doors  as  much  as  pos¬ 
sible  and  the  houses  were  not  crowded  with  furniture 
as  is  the  rule  in  the  modern  world.  The  list  of  furniture 
is  short:  chairs  and  stools,  beds,  tables,  chests,  rugs, 
utensils,  and  vases.  The  many  illustrations  on  Greek 
vases  give  us  a  good  idea  of  the  actual  appearance  of 
these  objects. 

Beds  were  used  not  only  for  sleeping  at  night  but 
also  for  use  at  meals,  at  banquets,  and  for  rest  and 
reading  by  day.  The  usual  material  was  wood,  the 
legs  straight  and  upright,  turned  or  square.  Cords  or 
leather  thongs  were  stretched  across  the  frame,  which 
consisted  of  four  strips  of  wood,  and  a  thin  mattress 
stuffed  with  wool  or  feathers  was  placed  thereon. 
Woolen  blankets,  rugs,  fleeces,  and  goat-skins  were 
used  as  coverings  and  cushions  and  pillows  were  em¬ 
ployed.  Sometimes  an  inclined  head-board  was  added 
to  the  equipment  of  the  couch. 

A  variety  of  chairs  was  in  common  use.  Of  these  the 
most  comfortable  was  the  thronos  (throne)  — a  heavy 
chair  with  back,  arms,  and  straight  legs  (turned  or 
square).  It  was  often  so  high  that  a  foot-stool  was 
needed.  The  thronos  was  the  chair  of  honor  and  al¬ 
ways,  as  in  Homer,  proffered  to  the  guest.  A  variation 
of  the  chair  just  described  was  an  easy  chair  with  slop¬ 
ing  back  and  curved  legs,  but  without  arms.  This  was 
called  the  klismos.  It  is  constantly  pictured  on  the 
vases.  Also  frequent  is  the  simple  stool,  with  either 
folding  legs  like  our  camp-stool,  or  with  straight,  rigid 
legs.  A  cushion  was  generally  used  with  the  stool. 
Benches,  too,  were  common.  The  vase-paintings  fre¬ 
quently  show  persons  seated  on  chests  which  were  in 
common  use  for  storing  clothes  and  valuables. 

Tables  were  not  used  for  so  many  purposes  as  with 
us.  The  dining  and  work  tables  were  small,  light,  and 


HOUSE,  FURNITURE,  AND  VASES 


41 


usually  rectangular;  they  had  either  three  or  four 
legs  and  these  were  straight  or  curved,  and  frequently 
ornamented.  The  table  was  in  constant  use  by  trades¬ 
men,  artisans  and  money-changers.  In  fact,  the  ancient 
and  modern  Greek  word  for  bank  is  trapeza  (table). 

Wax  candles  were  unknown  before  the  Roman  period. 
Torches  made  of  pine,  or  dry  sticks  covered  with 
pitch,  might  be  carried  at  night  in  the  streets  and  al¬ 
ways  appeared  at  festivals,  weddings  and  funerals. 
Lamps  of  all  sizes,  of  bronze  or  clay,  were  in  common 
use.  The  latter  were  turned  on  the  potters’  wheel,  al¬ 
though  late  Greek  lamps  were  made  on  a  mould.  In 
them  olive-oil  was  burned  with  wick  of  flax. 

Rush  mats  as  floor  coverings  were  found  in  poorer 
houses,  while  imported  rugs  from  Asia  Minor  could  be 
afforded  only  by  the  rich. 

Greek  mirrors  were  often  objects  of  beauty  and  works 
of  art  as  well  as  things  of  practical  utility.  They  were 
made  of  polished  metal,  generally  copper,  mixed  with 
tin,  zinc,  etc.,  often  silvered  or  gilded.  Frequently  they 
had  ornamental  handles  and  on  the  back  a  decoration 
usually  portraying  mythological  subjects.  To  prevent 
scratching  of  the  highly  polished  reflecting  surface  they 
were  usually  kept  in  special  boxes  and  these  might  be 
elaborately  and  beautifully  ornamented.  Many  in¬ 
teresting  and  artistic  examples  of  Greek  mirrors  and 
cases  may  be  seen  in  our  museums. 

Although  glass  was  known,  there  was  probably  no 
glass  at  all  in  use  in  the  Athenian  home  of  the  fifth  and 
fourth  centuries  b.c.  Household  and  kitchen  dishes, 
utensils,  and  drinking  vessels  were  made  of  pottery, 
bronze,  or  iron. 

Vessels  of  pottery  might  be  for  practical  use  only 
and  severely  plain,  those  of  larger  size  being  intended 
for  the  storing  or  transportation  of  oil,  wine,  water, 
grain,  and  provisions  generally,  the  smaller  for  manifold 
household  use.  In  shape,  however,  they  were  always 
graceful.  From  earliest  times  vases  and  vessels  of 
burnt  clay  were  made  in  all  parts  of  Greece  and  were 


42 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


fashioned  in  every  size  and  shape  and  adorned  and 
beautified  in  infinite  variety.  Not  only  are  Greek  vases, 
especially  those  of  Athenian  manufacture,  extremely 
artistic  in  outline  and  fabrication,  but  they  are  worthy 
of  special  study  and  admiration  because  of  the  beauty 
of  their  decoration.  Furthermore,  since  Greek  paint¬ 
ing  is  lost  to  us,  the  painted  decorations  on  the  vases  are 
of  particular  interest.  These  vase-paintings  portray 
scenes  of  every  kind  and  contribute  much  to  our  in¬ 
formation  respecting  Greek  art,  life,  and  mythology. 
They  furnish  us  with  contemporary  evidence  of  man¬ 
ners  and  customs  and  illustrate  daily  life  in  all  its  as¬ 
pects,  as  upon  the  vases  were  depicted  scenes  from  the 
shop  and  the  market,  from  the  theater  and  the  dance, 
from  the  school  and  the  palaestra,  from  war  and  myth¬ 
ology.  This  testimony  is  of  profound  importance  and 
interest  to  the  student  of  Greek  civilization.  Fortu¬ 
nately,  terra-cotta  is  an  almost  imperishable  material 
and  these  vases  have  been  excavated  in  countless  num¬ 
bers  in  all  Greek  lands.  As  they  were  generally  buried 
with  the  dead  they  are  commonly  found  in  tombs,  but 
almost  every  excavation  of  any  kind  yields  its  quota 
of  vases.  As  the  pottery  again  was  fired  after  the  ap¬ 
plication  of  the  glaze  and  ornamentation  the  vases  have 
been  found  wonderfully  well  preserved,  frequently  as 
perfect  as  on  the  day  of  manufacture.  In  the  museums 
of  Europe  and  America  large  and  carefully  chosen  col¬ 
lections  of  Greek  pottery  are  on  exhibition  and  these 
may  be  studied  at  first-hand. 

The  manufacture  of  vases  was  an  important  in¬ 
dustry  as  early  as  the  Mycenaean  Period,  when  Crete 
and  the  Aegean  islands  were  the  home  of  a  flourishing 
civilization.  In  the  decoration  of  the  vases  of  this 
period  motifs  taken  from  sea-life,  e.g.,  the  cuttle-fish, 
nautilus,  corals  and  shells,  are  common. 

The  succeeding  period  in  vase  making  is  called  the 
geometrical ,  as  the  decoration  on  the  pottery  is  geomet¬ 
ric,  the  surface  of  the  vase  being  covered  with  formal 
designs,  horizontal  and  perpendicular  lines  and  zigzag 


HOUSE,  FURNITURE,  AND  VASES 


43 


patterns.  The  most  finished  examples  of  this  ware 
come  mostly  from  Athens  and  are  as  late  in  date  as  the 
seventh  century  b.c. 

Corinth  and  Athens  became  the  two  chief  centers 
for  the  manufacture  and  exportation  of  artistic  vases. 
In  both  cities  clay  of  admirable  quality  for  pottery  was 
found.  The  clay  of  Corinth  is  extremely  light  in  color. 
The  early  Corinthian  ware  (seventh  and  sixth  centuries 
b.c.)  shows  marked  Oriental  influences  and  is  char¬ 
acterized  by  strips  of  decoration  in  which  appear  ani¬ 
mals,  plants,  and  ornaments  from  the  East,  together 
with  Hellenic  subjects.  In  the  sixth  and  fifth  centuries 
b.c.,  however,  Athens  assumed  the  lead  in  the  manu¬ 
facture  of  pottery  and  exported  her  perfect  ware  to  all 
parts  of  the  Greek  world.  Many  of  the  finest  examples 
of  Athenian  vases  have  been  found  in  Italy,  especially 
in  Etruria. 

At  Athens  the  clay  found  in  the  district  Ceramicus 
(Potters’  Quarter)  was  of  excellent  quality  and  here 
the  workshops  of  the  potters  were  located.  In  the 
process  of  manufacture  the  clay  was  washed  and 
kneaded,  red  earth  might  be  mixed  in,  and  the  body 
of  the  vase  turned  on  the  potters’  wheel.  The  handles 
were  made  separately  and  joined  to  the  body.  After 
drying  and  polishing,  the  vase  was  then  ready  to  re¬ 
ceive  its  decoration,  of  which  there  were  two  styles, 
viz.,  (i)  black  figures  on  a  light  background;  (2)  red 
figures  on  a  black  background. 

In  the  former  system,  which  was  in  vogue  to  the 
latter  part  of  the  sixth  century  b.c.,  the  figures  and 
ornaments  were  applied  in  black  silhouette  on  the  sur¬ 
face  of  the  vase,  the  background  being  the  buff  or  red¬ 
dish  tone  of  the  body  of  the  vessel.  The  figures  were 
painted  on  with  solid  black  varnish  and  this,  when 
fired,  became  a  lustrous  glaze.  Previous  to  the  final 
firing,  however,  additional  fine  details  were  incised  in 
the  figures  with  a  sharp-pointed  instrument. 

In  the  red-figured  style,  a  much  superior  system, 
which  superseded  the  black-figured  ware  at  the  end  of 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


the  sixth  century  and  thereafter,  the  figure  was  sketched 
with  details  and  the  background  was  covered  with  black 
glaze. 

Two  kinds  of  vases  peculiar  to  Athens  were  the  black- 
figured  Panathenaic  amphorae  and  the  white  lecythi . 
The  former  were  large  two-handled  vases,  which  were 
given  as  prizes  to  victors  in  the  Panathenaic  Games. 
These  vases  followed  a  set  fashion  and  were  always 
appropriately  inscribed  and  decorated  with  a  scene 
from  the  Games. 

The  lecythus,  an  oil-flask,  was  a  slender  graceful 
vase  of  great  charm  and  beauty,  with  peculiar  decora¬ 
tion  in  that  the  body  was  covered  generally  with  a 
white  slip  or  coating  of  paint.  Upon  this  as  background 
the  figures  were  drawn  in  fine  lines  and  filled  in  with 
washes  of  brown  or  red  or  other  color  which,  in  many 
cases,  unfortunately  have  faded.  These  lecythi  were 
intimately  associated  with  mourning,  burial,  and  the 
tomb;  in  fact,  burial  scenes  are  frequently  depicted 
upon  them.  They  have  been  found  in  large  numbers 
in  Attic  graves. 

Another  circumstance  of  interest  in  connection  with 
Greek  pottery  is  the  fact  that  maker  and  painter  often 
signed  their  wares.  Museums  have  many  examples  of 
these  vases  signed  by  such  masters  as  Nicosthenes, 
Euphronius,  Clitias,  and  Douris. 

The  most  common  kinds  of  Greek  vases,  classified 
according  to  their  forms,  are:  the  pithus,  a  large  jar 
sometimes  five  feet  high  and  used  for  storing  provisions, 
the  extremely  common  amphora ,  a  large  two-handled 
vase,  in  capacity  from  two  to  five  gallons,  employed 
for  carrying  and  storing  water,  wine,  and  provisions, 
the  hydria,  a  water-jar,  with  one  large  handle  and  two 
small  ones  on  the  sides,  the  crater ,  a  mixing-bowl,  with 
two  handles,  in  shape  like  a  big  punch-bowl,  the  stam- 
nus ,  a  variation  of  the  amphora  but  of  more  squat  form 
and  wider  mouth,  the  oenochoe,  in  shape  very  similar 
to  our  pitcher,  the  cylix,  a  drinking-cup,  rather  shallow, 
with  two  small  handles,  the  cantharus,  a  two-handled 


Oenochoe  Alabastrum  Stamnus  Lecythus  Olpe 

Fig.  26.  Shapes  of  Athenian  Black-figured  Vases  (Metropolitan  Museum) 


HOUSE,  FURNITURE,  AND  VASES 


45 


cup,  frequently  seen  in  representations  of  Dionysus, 
the  rhytum ,  a  drinking-horn,  often  made  in  the  likeness 
of  an  animal’s  head,  the  ary b alius,  a  small  round  vase, 
with  flat  mouth  and  small  orifice,  used  by  athletes  for 
rubbing  oil  on  the  person,  and  the  lecythus,  above  de¬ 
scribed  (See  Figs.  25  and  26  for  shapes). 

To  the  Greeks  the  designing,  manufacture,  and  dec¬ 
oration  of  pottery  seem  to  have  been  considered  merely 
a  minor  industry.  To  us,  however,  these  vases  are  a 
fascinating  study  because  of  their  symmetry  of  form 
and  charm  of  ornamentation.  And  as  previously  said, 
they  are  all  the  more  valuable  because  of  their  painted 
decoration  in  view  of  the  inevitable  loss  of  Greek  mural 
and  easel  painting. 


/ 


CHAPTER  VI 

SCULPTURE 


“  When  we  ask  what  is  the  debt  of  modern  art  to  Greek  art, 
there  is  no  reply.  We  can  point  to  this  idea  or  that,  and  say 
this  is  Hellenic  and  that  is  non-Hellenic.  We  can  say  this  is 
Pheidian,  that  Scopaic,  or  this  is  Pergamene  and  that  Rhodian, 
but  to  say  art  is  Greek  is  simply  to  say  it  is  good.  For  Greek 
art  comprises  every  genuine  effort  of  the  artist,  every  statue 
which  is  made  with  sincere  love  of  beauty  and  unmixed  desire 
for  its  attainment  is  Greek  in  spirit;  every  statue,  however  cun¬ 
ning  and  ingenious,  which  is  merely  frivolous  or  hypocritical  or 
untrue,  is  a  crime  against  Hellenism  and  a  sin  against  the  light. 
The  Greek  bequest  to  later  artists  is  nothing  tangible,  it  is  the 
soul  and  spirit  of  the  artist.”  —  Guy  Dickins. 


HE  indebtedness  of  the  world  of  today  to  the 


Greeks  is  perhaps  even  more  strikingly  shown 


-l  in  sculpture  than  in  the  other  arts.  Greek 
mural  and  easel  paintings  in  the  very  nature  of  the  case 
have  largely  perished.  Although  Greek  architecture 
provides  the  inspiration  and  the  actual  details  for  many 
of  our  noblest  buildings  and  monuments,  as  for  example 
the  beautiful  memorial  to  Abraham  Lincoln,  which  has 
been  recently  erected  at  Washington,  yet  subsequent 
centuries  evolved,  as  in  the  Gothic  style,  satisfying 
and  beautiful  architectural  forms.  In  sculpture,  on  the 
other  hand,  the  ancient  Greeks  still  remain  our  best 
guides  and  teachers,  so  perfect  are  their  works  of  art 
which  have  never  been  surpassed. 

Greek  sculpture  was  of  gradual  development,  as  the 
student  may  observe  through  a  long  series  of  surviving 
works  of  art.  First,  come  the  rather  crude  and  primi¬ 
tive  beginnings  in  the  Archaic  Period ,  before  500  b.c. 
Then,  during  the  Fifth  and  Fourth  Centuries  b.c.,  the 
artist,  having  acquired  mastery  of  his  medium,  produced 
works  of  superlative  excellence.  Next,  during  the 


SCULPTURE 


47 


Hellenistic  Period  ( ca .  320-100  b.c..)  the  sculptor,  still 
gifted  with  great  technical  skill,  exercised  greater  free¬ 
dom  of  choice  and  treatment  of  subject  and  turned 
more  towards  realism.  Finally,  in  the  Graeco-Roman 
Age,  original  inspiration  was  on  the  wane,  Greek  types 
served  the  Romans  as  patterns,  and  adaptations  were 
the  fashion. 

We  are  indebted  to  recent  excavations  in  Greek  lands 
for  many  examples  of  archaic  sculpture,  and  these  are 
now  chiefly  in  the  museums  of  Greece.  The  British 
Museum  in  London  has  the  Parthenon  marbles;  the 
Louvre,  in  Paris,  the  Aphrodite  of  Melos  and  the  Vic¬ 
tory  of  Samothrace;  Berlin,  the  sculptures  from  Per- 
gamum;  Munich,  the  pediment  statues  from  Aegina; 
Florence,  Naples,  and  other  European  cities  possess 
some  excellent  pieces.  The  Vatican  Museum  in  Rome 
has  almost  countless  Greek  statues,  although  the  major¬ 
ity  are  copies.  The  collections  of  original  Greek  art  in 
the  Metropolitan  Museum  of  Art  in  New  York  and  the 
Boston  Museum  of  Fine  Arts  are  not  of  great  size,  but 
they  are  choice  and  of  great  value  to  American  students 
and  lovers  of  art. 

It  is  important  to  note  at  the  outset  that  the  Greek 
sculptor  worked  hand  in  hand  with  the  architect.  A 
shrine  of  a  god  always  housed  an  appropriate  cult 
statue  and,  as  we  have  seen  in  the  case  of  the  Parthe¬ 
non,  the  exterior  of  a  temple  might  be  richly  adorned 
with  works,  of  sculpture.  The  pediments  might  contain 
statues  in  the  round;  the  metopes  were  sometimes 
adorned  with  sculpture  in  relief,  and  a  decorative  frieze 
with  carving  in  relief  might  even  run  around  the  entire 
building.  This  combination  of  architecture  and  decora¬ 
tive  sculpture  so  happily  achieved  by  the  Greeks  af¬ 
fords  a  striking  lesson  of  successful  artistic  accom¬ 
plishment  —  a  lesson  which  should  be  taken  to  heart 
in  modern  times  and  followed  more  frequently  than  it 
is.  Individual  statues,  conceived  and  executed  without 
relation  to  the  decoration  of  buildings  —  substantive 


48 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


or  free  sculpture,  as  the  text-books  designate  this  class 

—  were,  of  course,  common. 

Another  striking  characteristic  of  Greek  sculpture, 
in  contrast  with  the  general  modern  practice,  was  poly- 
chromy  or  the  application  of  color.  Numerous  statues 
have  been  unearthed  in  recent  years  which  still  bear 
vivid  traces  of  the  colors  originally  used. 

Many  materials  were  employed  by  the  Greeks  for 
statuary.  We  read  of  primitive  wooden  images  of  the 
gods;  these,  of  course,  have  not  survived.  Bronze  was  a 
popular  metal  for  statuary  in  the  open,  as,  for  example, 
the  statues  of  athletes.  Some  of  these  are  extant,  but 
most  of  them  have  disappeared,  as  many  have  been 
melted  down  for  the  metal  they  contained.  In  numerous 
cases  they  live  again  through  extant  marble  copies.  In 
the  so-called  chryselephantine  (gold  and  ivory)  statues 

—  e.g.,  that  of  Athena  Parthenos  by  Phidias  —  the 
framework  was  of  wood.  Terra-cotta  (baked  clay)  was 
an  extremely  common  material  in  the  making  of  small 
images  or  statuettes,  and  was  even  employed  occasion¬ 
ally  for  large  statues  in  Cyprus  and  southern  Italy. 
The  Tanagra  statuettes,  and  the  little  figures  of  painted 
terra-cotta  found  in  many  places  —  e.g.,  at  Myrina  in 
Asia  Minor  and  Tarentum  in  southern  Italy  —  are  life¬ 
like,  graceful,  and  appealing. 

Various  kinds  and  qualities  of  stone  and  marble  were 
the  materials  out  of  which  most  surviving  Greek 
statuary  is  fashioned.  The  islands  of  Naxos  and  Paros 
produced  marble  for  the  sculptor’s  needs,  although  the 
Parian  marble,  of  finer  grain,  supplanted  the  Naxian. 
The  marble  of  Mt.  Pentelicus,  so  extensively  used  for 
Athenian  building  purposes,  was  a  convenient  and  more 
accessible  material.  The  Pentelic  stone,  however,  con¬ 
tains  iron  and  is  subject  to  discoloration  when  it  is 
long  exposed  to  the  elements. 

Although  the  museums  of  the  world  are  richly 
stocked  with  works  of  Greek  art,  these  statues  are,  for 
the  most  part,  copies  of  originals.  Original  specimens 
are  by  no  means  rare,  yet  masterpieces  of  the  best 


SCULPTURE 


49 


period  of  Greek  art  are  not  numerous.  For  example, 
we  have  only  one  identified  original  statue  as  it  came 
from  the  hand  of  a  great  Greek  sculptor  —  the  cele¬ 
brated  Hermes  of  Praxiteles,  found  in  the  excavation 
of  Olympia. 

The  Archaic  Period  (down  to  480  b.c.) 

The  excavations  of  recent  years  in  Greek  lands  have 
brought  to  light  numerous  works  of  art  of  the  archaic 
period.  These  statues  in  the  round,  of  the  sixth  cen¬ 
tury  b.c.,  in  general  admit  of  a  triple  classification. 
There  are  nude,  standing,  male  figures  —  the  so-called 
Apollos;  draped,  standing  figures,  generally  female; 
and  draped,  seated  figures.  These  early  works  of  art 
are  decidedly  primitive.  The  pose  is  rigid,  the  outline 
angular,  and  the  treatment  of  details,  especially  in  the 
face,  leaves  much  to  be  desired.  The  figure,  severely 
frontal,  is  stiffly  erect.  The  statues  show  promise,  but 
the  artist  has  many  technical  difficulties  to  surmount. 
The  so-called  Apollo  of  Tenea  (now  in  Munich)  is  an 
excellent  example  of  the  nude  male  type  of  the  archaic 
period.  Numerous  relief  sculptures,  too,  of  this  early 
time  have  been  found  in  many  parts  of  the  Greek  world. 

Specimens  of  early  Attic  sculpture  were  unearthed 
on  the  Acropolis  in  the  excavations  of  the  debris  of  the 
temples  which  were  destroyed  by  the  Persians  in  480 
b.c.  Among  these  works  are  figures  from  pediment- 
reliefs  of  soft  limestone,  with  details  in  color,  a  statue 
of  a  man  carrying  a  bullock  (moschophorus) ,  and  a 
number  of  draped  female  figures,  which  were  made  by 
sculptors  of  the  school  of  the  island  of  Chios  and  their 
Attic  pupils,  e.g.,  Antenor.  The  most  beautiful  of  these 
early  female  statues  from  the  Acropolis  is  that  of  a 
maiden,  a  work  dedicated  by  Euthydicus.  This  figure 
is  of  great  charm  and  the  treatment  of  the  head  and 
features  shows  marked  artistic  advance  (Fig.  27). 

An  interesting  example  of  early  Attic  art  is  the  grave¬ 
stone  {stele)  of  Aristion,  by  Aristocles,  found  at  Mara- 


50 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


thon,  m  which  the  warrior  is  shown,  standing  as  in  life, 
clad  in  armor  and  helmet,  and  with  spear  in  hand.  The 
details,  although  inaccurate  in  many  respects,  are  care¬ 
fully  worked  out  by  the  sculptor.  The  figure  reveals 
the  exaggerated  musculature  which  is  a  characteristic 
of  the  work  of  the  early  artists.  Traces  of  pigment  are 
still  visible  (Fig.  28). 

Greek  art  of  the  pre-Persian  period  is  further  rep¬ 
resented  by  the  sculptures  from  the  treasury  of  the 
Cnidians  at  Delphi,  sculptured  metopes  from  temples  at 
Selinus  in  Sicily,  the  relief  of  the  so-called  Harpy 
Tomb  from  Lycia  in  the  British  Museum,  and  numerous 
other  specimens  of  early  schools.  A  little  later  than 
480  b.c.  probably  are  the  life-like  figures  from  the  so- 
called  temple  of  Aphaia  on  the  island  of  Aegina.  These 
well-known  Aeginetan  Marbles,  with  a  few  exceptions 
now  in  the  Glyptothek  at  Munich,  are  from  the  two 
pediments  of  the  temple.  They  represent  fighting 
warriors  (Fig.  29),  with  the  goddess  Athena  in  the 
center  of  each  gable. 

The  Fifth  Century  (480-400  b.c.) 

The  years  480-400  b.c.,  which  witnessed  so  many 
momentous  developments  in  Greek  civilization,  like¬ 
wise  produced  masterpieces  of  art. 

The  excavations  at  Olympia  revealed  many  examples 
of  sculpture  of  a  few  years  prior  to  457  b.c.,  the  ap¬ 
proximate  date  of  the  completion  of  the  temple  of  Zeus. 
From  this  temple  were  found  a  number  of  the  figures 
from  the  pediment  groups.  These  represent,  as  we  are 
told  by  Pausanias,  in  the  eastern  gable,  the  preparation 
for  the  chariot  race  between  Pelops  and  Oenomaus  and, 
in  the  western,  the  fight  of  Lapiths  and  Centaurs  at  the 
wedding  of  Pirithous.  Most  striking  of  these  statues 
is  the  figure  of  Apollo,  which  stood  in  the  center  of  the 
western  pediment.  The  metopes  pictured  the  twelve 
labors  of  Heracles.  Among  other  discoveries  at  Olym¬ 
pia  is  the  Victory  (Nike)  of  the  sculptor  Paeonius. 


Fig.  27.  Acropolis  Maiden  (Athens)  Fig.  28.  Stele  or  Fig.  29.  Figure  from  Temple  at  Aegina 

Aristion 


P4 

a 

H 

O 


a 

c 

C/3 

a 

O 

a 

Kl 

o 

Eh 

tj 


> 


CO 

6 
i— i 


SCULPTURE 


51 


This  statue  (Fig.  30)  was  erected  after  the  battle  of 
Sphacteria  in  425  b.c.,  and  represents  the  winged 
goddess  as  if  suspended  in  the  air,  with  drapery  and 
mantle  clinging  to  the  figure  floating  behind.  It  was  a 
custom  of  the  Greeks  to  erect  a  statue  of  Victory  as 
a  goddess  and  we  shall  see  another  admirable  example 
of  the  type  in  the  Victory  found  at  Samothrace,  a  fine 
specimen  of  the  art  of  the  Hellenistic  Age  (Fig.  31). 

Also  of  the  first  half  of  the  fifth  century  b.c.  are  the 
vigorous  marble  statues  of  Harmodius  and  Aristogiton, 
the  tyrannicides,  in  the  museum  at  Naples.  This  group 
is  a  copy  of  originals  by  Critius  and  Nesiotes.  Of  this 
same  period,  but  of  uncertain  date  and  authorship,  is 
a  statue  of  first-rate  excellence  —  the  bronze  charioteer 
found  at  Delphi  (Fig.  36).  The  chariot,  steeds,  and  the 
goddess  Victory,  a  group  of  which  the  charioteer  was  a 
part,  have  disappeared.  The  youthful  driver,  clad  in  a 
long  chiton  reaching  almost  to  the  ankles,  stands 
erect,  the  right  arm,  holding  the  reins,  outstretched. 
The  details  of  the  features,  the  hair  which  is  bound 
with  a  fillet,  and  the  drapery  are  reproduced  with  the 
utmost  delicacy  and  charm. 

The  three  greatest  sculptors  of  the  fifth  century  b.c. 
were  Myron,  Polyclitus,  and  Phidias. 

Myron  of  Eleutherae,  in  northern  Attica,  was  famous 
in  antiquity  for  his  statues  of  athletes.  We  are  fortu¬ 
nate  in  having  several  marble  copies  of  Roman  date  of 
his  Discobolus  or  Discus  Thrower  (Fig.  41).  This  is 
the  statue  of  a  vigorous  athlete  who  is  shown,  with  body 
turned  and  with  muscles  at  tension,  at  the  moment 
before  hurling  the  discus.  Myron’s  technical  skill  as 
shown  in  this  unusual  study  is  remarkable,  when  his 
early  date  is  considered.  It  should  be  observed  further 
that  Myron  achieved  fame  by  his  figures  of  animals 
and  especially  by  a  life-like  statue  of  a  cow.  This 
is  noteworthy  —  as  the  representation  of  animals  is 
generally  thought  to  be  of  a  later  period  only. 

Polyclitus,  of  the  Argive  school,  won  renown  through 
his  bronze  statues  of  athletes.  Two  of  his  works  are 


52 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


known  to  us  through  marble  copies.  The  Doryphorus 
(Fig.  39)  represents  a  youth  of  rather  massive  physique, 
who  carries,  over  his  left  shoulder,  a  spear.  The  Diadu- 
menus  is  the  figure  of  a  youthful  athlete  who  stands 
with  both  arms  upraised  to  bind  the  fillet  of  victory 
about  his  head.  Attributed  also  to  Polyclitus  is  one 
type  of  the  series  of  extant  statues  which  represent  the 
Amazons. 

We  have  already  surveyed  (Chapter  IV)  the  archi¬ 
tectural  monuments  of  the  Athens  of  Pericles.  In  the 
description  of  the  Acropolis  in  that  chapter  will  be 
found  a  brief  account  of  the  sculptures  which  were  an 
integral  part  of  the  adornment  of  the  citadel  —  the 
Caryatides  of  the  southern  porch  of  the  Erechtheum, 
the  figures  in  relief  of  the  Winged  Victories  from  the 
balustrade  of  the  temple  of  Wingless  Victory  and,  most 
important  of  all,  the  numerous  sculptures  which  were 
executed,  or  inspired  and  supervised,  by  Phidias.  These 
works  comprised  the  colossal  statue  of  Athena  Proma¬ 
chos  (the  Champion)  which  stood  on  the  Acropolis,  the 
chryselephantine  (gold  and  ivory)  image  of  Athena 
Parthenos  in  the  Parthenon,  and  the  pediment  figures, 
sculptured  metopes,  and  Panathenaic  frieze  of  Athena’s 
temple. 

Phidias  also  executed  a  large  statue  of  Zeus  in  the 
temple  at  Olympia,  and  Lucian  admired  as  a  beautiful 
example  of  the  art  of  Phidias  a  statue  of  Lemnian 
Athena. 

It  may  be  said  with  little  fear  of  contradiction  that 
there  are  no  finer  or  more  perfect  examples  of  sculptural 
art  as  employed  in  decoration  than  the  marbles  of  the 
Parthenon. 

For  the  most  part  the  pediment  statues,  in  so  far 
as  they  have  been  preserved,  are  in  the  Lord  Elgin 
collection  of  the  British  Museum.  Impressive  indeed 
are  these  figures,  particularly  the  so-called  Theseus 
(Fig.  32),  and  the  three  “  Fates  ”  (Fig.  33).  Fifteen 
of  the  ninety-two  sculptured  metopes  are  also  in  the 


Fig.  3 2.  “Theseus”  (E.  pediment,  Parthenon) 


Fig.  33.  “Three  Fates”  (E.  pediment,  Parthenon) 


Fig.  34.  Horsemen  from  Parthenon  Frieze 


Fig.  35.  Hermes  of  Praxiteles  (Olympia)  Fig.  36.  Bronze  Charioteer  (Delphi) 


SCULPTURE 


53 


British  Museum.  These  portray  combats  of  centaurs 
with  Lapiths  and  vary  considerably  in  style  and  merit. 

This  variation  is  to  be  explained  by  the  fact  that 
various  hands  must  have  executed  the  decorative  sculp¬ 
tures  of  the  Parthenon.  The  ornamentation  of  the 
temple  with  its  very  many  figures  and  reliefs  —  a  work 
accomplished  in  a  comparatively  few  years  —  was  far 
too  onerous  a  task  for  the  genius  and  industry  of  even 
such  a  master-artist  as  Phidias. 

Of  unique  beauty  are  the  graceful  and  life-like  figures 
of  the  frieze  of  the  Parthenon  which  ran  around  the 
outside  of  the  cella,  inside  of  the  columns. 

This  frieze,  high  up  on  the  cella  wall,  is  only  about 
3  feet  4  inches  high  and  is  carved  about  an  inch  and  a 
half  in  average  depth.  The  upper  portion  of  the  frieze 
has  greater  depth  than  the  lower  and  is  carved  in 
sharper  outline,  since  the  spectator  looked  at  the  figures 
from  below.  The  lighting,  too,  came  entirely  from  be¬ 
low.  The  scene  pictured  is  the  Panathenaic  procession 
of  the  games,  which  were  celebrated  with  peculiar  mag¬ 
nificence  every  four  years.  Most  of  the  extant  slabs  are 
in  the  British  Museum;  a  few  are  still  on  the  building 
or  in  the  museum  in  Athens.  The  sacred  procession, 
as  seen  on  the  temple,  starts  at  the  western  end  and 
proceeds  on  the  northern  and  southern  sides  to  the  east¬ 
ern  front.  The  various  celebrants  are  appropriately 
and  graphically  depicted.  We  see  the  young  knights 
with  their  steeds  (Fig.  34),  chariots  and  charioteers 
and  warriors,  the  animals  —  cows  and  sheep  —  for  the 
sacrifice,  the  maidens  carrying  sacred  vessels,  and  citi¬ 
zens  and  spectators.  On  the  eastern  front  of  the  temple 
are  the  august  seated  figures  of  the  twelve  gods,  a 
priest  and  priestess,  two  maidens  and  an  attendant. 

In  these  original  and  beautiful  carvings  Attic  sculp¬ 
ture  reached  its  zenith.  The  Parthenon  marbles  stand 
forth  for  all  time  as  a  glorious  revelation  of  artistic 
achievement.  The  Athenian  sculptor  was  proven  to  be 
the  peer  of  the  Athenian  architect  and  builder. 


54 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


The  Fourth  Century  b.c. 

There  are  indications  of  changing  taste  in  Greek 
sculpture  of  the  fourth  century  b.c.  The  classic  reserve 
and  the  simplicity  of  the  sculpture  of  the  earlier  period 
are  not  so  conspicuous.  The  personality  of  the  indi¬ 
vidual  artist  is  now  much  more  in  evidence  and  emotion 
and  sentiment  find  expression  as,  for  example,  in  the 
beautiful  and  melancholy  features  of  the  statue  of 
Demeter  of  Cnidus  in  the  British  Museum,  and  in  the 
copy  of  the  group  by  Cephisodotus  —  the  goddess 
Peace,  who  looks  with  affection  upon  the  infant  god  of 
Wealth  on  her  arm. 

Three  sculptors  of  the  fourth  century,  who  enjoyed 
great  reputation,  were  Scopas  of  Paros,  Praxiteles  of 
Athens,  and  Lysippus  of  Sicyon. 

According  to  the  ancient  writers,  Scopas  produced 
many  works  of  art  and  these  were  notable  in  that  they 
expressed  intense  emotion.  It  is  probable  that  he  is 
known  to  us  through  four  marble  heads  from  the  pedi¬ 
ments  of  the  temple  of  Athena  Alea  at  Tegea.  Con¬ 
spicuous  in  these  heads  are  the  heavy  brows,  the  parted 
lips,  the  deep-set  eyes  and  the  distant  gaze  directed 
upward.  We  know,  too,  that  Scopas  was  one  of  the 
artists  who  were  engaged  in  the  execution  of  decorative 
sculpture  for  the  Mausoleum  at  Halicarnassus.  Many 
fine  sculptural  remains  from  this  great  memorial  build¬ 
ing  are  now  in  the  British  Museum.  Conspicuous 
among  them  are  two  colossal  figures  of  the  ruler  Mauso- 
lus  and  his  wife,  Artemisia. 

Of  original  sculpture  from  the  hand  of  Praxiteles, 
a  sculptor  of  wide  fame  in  ancient  times,  we  are  for¬ 
tunate  in  having  a  genuine  specimen.  This  is  the  well- 
known  statue  of  Hermes  (Fig.  35),  which  was  found  in 
the  excavation  of  the  temple  of  Hera  at  Olympia.  The 
identification  is  certain,  as  Pausanias  says  that  one  of 
the  statues  in  the  Heraeum  (temple  of  Hera)  at  Olym¬ 
pia  was  a  marble  Hermes,  carrying  the  infant  Dionysus, 
the  work  of  Praxiteles.  Although  the  lower  part  of  the 
legs,  with  the  exception  of  the  right  foot,  and  part  of 


SCULPTURE 


55 


the  right  arm  are  missing,  the  remainder  of  the  figure 
and  the  entire  head  are  wonderfully  preserved.  The 
exquisite  finish  of  the  surface  of  the  Parian  marble  is 
unmarred. 

The  Hermes  is  portrayed  as  an  athletic,  youthful 
figure,  of  more  slender  physique  than  the  sturdy  athletes 
of  Polyclitus.  He  stands  naturally  and  gracefully,  with 
left  leg  slightly  bent.  The  left  arm  which  supports  the 
child  rests  upon  a  tree-trunk,  over  which  hangs  his 
cloak.  The  folds  of  the  garment  are  depicted  with 
masterly  skill.  The  uplifted  right  hand  held  some  ob¬ 
ject,  possibly  a  bunch  of  grapes,  to  attract  the  child’s 
attention.  The  head  is  strikingly  executed  with  strong 
nose,  broad  forehead  which  bulges  slightly  above  the 
brows,  and  rather  narrow  eyes.  The  lower  part  of  the 
face  gradually  narrows.  The  close-cropped  locks  of 
hair  are  only  roughly  blocked  out,  in  impressionistic 
fashion.  The  infant  was  but  sketchily  represented 
as  it  was  merely  an  accessory.  The  somewhat  dreamy 
gaze  of  the  god  is  not  fixed  upon  the  child. 

Modern  criticism  pronounces  this  figure  of  the  youth¬ 
ful  god  by  Praxiteles  a  masterpiece.  And  yet  it  was 
but  one  of  numerous  statues  of  equal,  or  greater,  merit 
which  the  Greeks  created  and  enjoyed,  but  which  un¬ 
fortunately  have  not  been  preserved  for  us. 

Several  other  works  of  Praxiteles  are  known  to  us 
from  copies  —  e.g.,  the  Aphrodite  of  Cnidus  and  his 
Satyr  (the  Marble  Faun  of  Hawthorne).  In  Athens 
is  a  marble  relief  consisting  of  three  slabs,  from  Man- 
tinea,  which  shows  the  contest  in  music  between  Apollo 
and  Marsyas.  This  was  doubtless  designed,  if  not 
carved,  by  Praxiteles. 

Lysippus  was  the  distinguished  and  prolific  head  of 
the  school  of  sculpture  which  long  flourished  at  Sicyon 
in  the  Peloponnesus.  He  worked  in  bronze  almost  ex¬ 
clusively,  hence  it  is  not  surprising  that  no  original 
statue  by  him  has  come  down  to  us.  For  bronze 
statues,  as  has  been  observed,  have  been  melted  down 
for  the  most  part  for  the  metal  they  contained.  It  is 


56 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


possible  that  in  one  of  the  marble  statues  found  at 
Delphi — that  of  Agias,  a  Thessalian  athlete  —  \ve 
have  a  copy  of  an  original  bronze  work  by  Lysippus. 
At  any  rate  the  Lysippic  school  of  athletic  sculpture, 
as  described  by  Pliny,  seems  to  be  exemplified  in  the 
Apoxyomenus  (Fig.  40)  in  the  Vatican.  This  well- 
known  statue  represents  a  slender,  well-proportioned 
athlete,  who  stands  in  an  easy,  graceful  posture.  The 
left  hand  holds  a  strigil,  and  with  this  instrument  he  is 
engaged  in  scraping  from  the  under  surface  of  the  out¬ 
stretched  right  arm  the  oil  and  sand  of  the  exercise- 
ground.  The  head  and  features  are  rather  small,  the 
neck  slender.  Of  particular  merit  is  the  natural  and 
careful  treatment  of  the  hair.  The  poise  and  finish 
of  this  athletic  figure  is  so  remarkable  that  the  observer 
perforce  is  moved  to  inspect  and  admire  the  statue  from 
every  angle.  Among  the  works  of  Lysippus  were 
statues  of  Alexander,  and  extant  portraits  of  the  great 
general  seem  to  show  Lysippic  influence. 

Other  sculptured  works  of  merit  of  the  fourth  cen¬ 
tury  are  fragments  from  the  Artemisium  at  Ephesus, 
a  splendid  bronze  athlete  with  a  strigil,  also  from 
Ephesus  (in  Vienna),  and  the  so-called  Ariadne. 

It  is  convenient  to  speak  here  of  the  marble  sarcoph¬ 
agi  discovered  at  Sidon  and  now  in  Constantinople. 
These  sarcophagi  —  one  is  of  the  fifth  century  —  are 
decorated  with  relief  sculptures,  which  are  remarkably 
well  preserved.  The  original  colors  —  such  as  red, 
light-blue,  yellow  and  brown  — are  still  clear  and  bright 
upon  the  “  Alexander  Sarcophagus/’  so-called  because 
the  scenes  depicted  thereon  represent  the  Macedonian 
general  in  battle  and  hunting. 

A  small  relief  of  a  horseman  (Metropolitan  Museum, 
New  York)  is  an  admirable  example  of  fourth-century 
work.  The  modeling  of  the  rider  and  of  the  prancing 
steed  are  of  great  merit,  while  the  composition  as  a 
whole  is  reminiscent  of  the  horsemen  of  the  Parthenon 
frieze. 

An  extremely  beautiful  bronze  figure,  perhaps  a  copy 


SCULPTURE 


57 


of  an  original  of  possibly  the  fourth  century,  is  the 
statue  of  a  handsome  youth  of  athletic  type,  now  in 
Athens.  It  was  found  some  years  ago  by  sponge-divers 
not  far  from  the  island  of  Cythera.  The  authorship  is 
unknown. 

It  remains  to  speak  of  an  appealing  type  of  sculpture, 
mostly  reliefs,  the  Attic  tombstones.  Our  museums 
possess  many  examples  of  these  gravestones  which  are 
of  interest  and  of  value  to  us  in  many  ways.  They  are 
in  date  mostly  of  the  fourth  century,  although  many  of 
them  show  fifth  century  influence.  They  are  not  the 
product  of  great  artists,  but  of  the  Athenian  workshops. 
Their  merit,  often  considerable,  and  sometimes  striking, 
reveal  the  taste  and  skill  of  even  the  artisan.  They  fre¬ 
quently  represent  scenes  from  life  and  depict  the  dead 
as  in  life,  sometimes  with  singular  refinement  and 
delicacy.  Best  known  of  these  reliefs  are  the  tomb¬ 
stones  of  Hegeso  and  of  Dexileus.  The  former  repre¬ 
sents  the  deceased,  a  lady,  handsome  and  dignified  — 
Hegeso,  daughter  of  Proxenus,  as  the  inscription 
tells  us  —  who  is  seated  on  a  chair  (a  klismos) .  She 
is  engaged  in  selecting  some  article  of  adornment  from 
a  jewel-casket,  which  is  held  by  a  maid,  who  stands 
before  her.  On  the  latter  monument  an  inscription  in¬ 
forms  us  that  the  deceased  Dexileus,  who  is  shown  on 
a  rearing  steed  striking  down  an  enemy,  was  one  of 
five  knights  who  were  killed  in  the  battle  of  Corinth, 
394  b.c.  The  inscription  reads:  “  Dexileus  of  Thori- 
cus,  son  of  Lysanias.  Born  in  the  archonship  of  Tisan- 
der  [414/3  b.c.];  died  in  the  archonship  of  Eubulides 
[394/3  b.c.]  in  Corinth,  of  the  five  knights.” 

Hellenistic  Sculpture  (ca.  320-100  b.c.) 

As  we  have  seen,  the  conquest  of  Asia  and  Egypt  by 
Alexander  was  followed  by  the  rapid  spread  of  the 
.Greek  language  and  culture.  Greek  sculpture,  likewise, 
was  no  longer  largely  confined  to  limited  spheres  of 
activity,  but  during  the  Hellenistic  Age  flourished  at 


58 


GREEK,  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


numerous  centers  which  were  founded  or  fostered  by 
the  Macedonian  conqueror.  Athens  no  longer  was 
paramount.  It  was  not  Alexandria,  however,  the  center 
of  the  literary  and  scholarly  activities  of  the  new  era, 
that  assumed  the  leadership  in  sculpture.  Pergamum, 
Ephesus,  Tralles,  and  Rhodes  were  the  most  famous 
schools  of  the  sculptural  art. 

The  tendency  of  the  sculptors  of  this  period  was  to 
depart  still  further  from  the  strict  canons  and  types  of 
the  earlier  time.  We  find,  in  general,  the  artist  allow¬ 
ing  himself  far  greater  freedom  in  the  selection  of  his 
subject  and  in  the  manner  of  its  execution.  The  old- 
time  self-restraint  gives  way  to  the  expression  of  the 
individuality  of  the  artist  and  the  portrayal  of  his  emo¬ 
tions.  Realism,  not  idealism,  is  to  the  fore.  Thus 
we  have  depicted,  not  idealized  deities,  not  perfect 
youthful  male  and  female  types  only,  but  old  age  and 
childhood,  shepherds  and  satyrs.  A  good  example  of 
these  realistic  types  is  the  old  market-woman  in  the 
Metropolitan  Museum.  Humor  now  finds  artistic  ex¬ 
pression  and  animal  life  is  frequently  represented.  Es¬ 
pecially  does  portraiture  flourish  in  this  later  period, 
and  Alexander  of  Macedon  is  a  favorite  subject. 

It  must  not  be  inferred,  however,  that  the  Hellen¬ 
istic  Age  is  a  period  of  decadence  in  art,  when  works  of 
inferior  merit  and  of  dubious  taste  only  were  produced. 
Many  splendid,  vigorous,  and  beautiful  statues  are  of 
this  time. 

We  have  already  mentioned  the  magnificent  Victory 
from  Samothrace  in  the  Louvre,  one  of  the  most  prized 
statues  of  antiquity  (Fig.  31).  This  winged  figure  of 
the  goddess  of  Victory,  standing  on  the  prow  of  a  ship,  is 
thought  to  have  been  set  up  perhaps  in  306  b.c-  by 
Demetrius  Poliorcetes  to  commemorate  a  naval  victory. 
The  pose  is  striking  and  the  effect  is  expremely  impres¬ 
sive. 

The  school  of  Pergamum,  so  important  in  this  period, 
is  known  to  us  through  copies  of  groups  erected  by 
Attalus  I  of  the  third  century  b.c.,  and  by  originals  of 
the  reign  of  Eumenes  II  of  the  second  century.  The 


SCULPTURE 


59 


former  period  is  represented  by  the  statue  of  the 
“  Dying  Gaul  ”  —  once  called  the  Dying  Gladiator  — 
in  the  Capitoline  Museum  at  Rome,  and  also  by  a  series 
of  figures  of  fighters  fallen  in  combat,  about  three  feet 
high.  Sculpture  of  the  later  period  was  found  in  the 
German  excavations  at  Pergamum  and  consists  of 
fragments  of  friezes  from  the  great  altar  of  Zeus  and 
Athena.  The  scene  depicted  on  the  larger  is  the  battle 
of  the  gods  and  giants.  The  school  of  art  of  Pergamum 
is  characterized  by  intense  realism,  dramatic  power, 
successful  and  vigorous  portrayal  of  emotion  and  pain, 
and  skill  in  the  rendering  of  anatomy. 

The  Apollo  Belvedere  of  the  Vatican  and  its  counter¬ 
part,  the  Artemis  of  Versailles,  are  works  of  grace  and 
refinement,  but  soon  chill  the  observer’s  admiration  by 
reason  of  their  artificiality  and  theatricalism. 

Other  examples  of  this  Age  are  the  dramatic  group 
of  Niobe  and  her  children  —  probably  later  than  the 
fourth  century,  the  realistic  portrait-statue  of  Demos¬ 
thenes,  and  the  popular  group  of  a  little  boy  struggling 
with  a  goose  —  possibly  a  copy  of  a  work  by  Boethus. 

Of  the  Hellenistic  Age,  too,  is  the  world’s  most  fa¬ 
mous  statue,  the  Aphrodite  of  Melos  (Venus  of  Milo), 
also  in  the  Louvre  (Fig.  37).  The  handsome  head  and 
features  are  worthy  of  the  goddess  of  love  and  beauty. 
The  nude  upper  part  of  the  body  is  beautifully  modeled. 
The  whole  figure  is  animate  with  dignity  and  loveliness. 
The  date  and  authorship  of  the  statue  are  unknown  and 
have  been  much  discussed.  It  may  be  of  interest  to 
quote  the  latest  views  of  these  questions  as  expressed 
by  Mr.  Guy  Dickins  in  his  book  on  Hellenistic  Sculp - 
ture  (p.  63):  “  The  restoration  of  the  figure  is  now 

easy.  With  her  right  hand  the  goddess  held,  or  was 
about  to  hold,  her  drapery  to  prevent  it  from  slipping, 
her  left  elbow  rested  on  the  pillar,  and  her  left  hand, 
palm  upwards,  held  an  apple,  a  frequent  symbol  of 
Aphrodite.  The  date  is  between  180— 160  b.c.  The 
pose  is  reminiscent  of  Lysippus.  The  head-type  is 
Scopaic,  but  at  second-hand,  since  the  influence  of 


60 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Pergamum  is  stronger.  The  twist  of  the  body,  the 
reason  why  she  is  half  naked,  the  drapery  —  these  are 
to  be  explained  on  the  supposition  that  the  statue  is 
strongly  influenced  by  the  Venus  of  Capua  (Fig.  38), 
who  is  represented  as  admiring  her  beauty  in  the  mirror 
of  the  shield  of  Ares,  the  shield-edge  holding  up  her 
drapery  against  her  left  hip.  All  examples  of  this  type 
go  back  to  an  early  Hellenistic  or  late  fourth-century 
statue  of  the  Armed  Aphrodite.  The  Melian  goddess 
was  a  second-century  Hellenistic  copy,  or  rather 
adaptation.” 

The  Graeco-Roman  Period 

The  Hellenistic  Age  passed  over  into  the  Graeco- 
Roman  Period  with  no  appreciable  line  of  demarcation. 
As  in  other  realms  of  achievement  originality  in  art 
also  declined.  Sculptors  busied  themselves  largely  in 
the  making  of  copies  of  earlier  masterpieces.  Adapta¬ 
tions,  too,  are  numerous.  Greek  sculptors,  in  great 
numbers,  flocked  to  Rome  where  their  services  were  in 
demand  for  the  carving  of  copies  and  the  making  of 
portraits.  In  fact,  Greek  art  was  so  much  appreciated 
at  Rome  that  Greek  lands  were  mercilessly  looted  by 
Roman  officials.  Statues,  by  the  shipload,  were  carried 
to  Rome  to  embellish  triumphal  processions  and  to 
adorn  Roman  villas.  Shipwrecked  Roman  galleys,  with 
cargoes  of  Greek  sculpture,  have  been  discovered  lying 
on  the  bottom  of  the  sea  south  of  the  Peloponnesus  and 
off  the  coast  of  northern  Africa. 

Two  prominent  Greek  artists  of  the  Graeco-Roman 
Period  were  Pasiteles  and  Arcesilaus.  The  former  was 
the  author  of  a  work  on  Greek  art  which  served  as  a 
source  for  Pliny.  To  Pasiteles  is  attributed  the  use  of 
clay  models  for  his  statues  of  marble.  This  procedure 
made  inevitable  the  practice  of  the  making  of  numer¬ 
ous  copies  of  a  popular  original  by  pupils  and  workmen 
and  thus  paved  the  way  for  commercialism. 

Individual  works  of  sculpture  of  the  Graeco-Roman 
Period  which  are  well-known  to  students  of  art  are  the 


Fig.  37.  Aphrodite  of  Melos  (Louvre)  Fig.  38.  Aphrodite  (Venus)  of  Capua 


SCULPTURE 


61 


beautiful,  but  self-conscious,  Venus  dei  Medici  in  Flor¬ 
ence,  the  Capitoline  Venus,  the  Venus  Genetrix  in  the 
Louvre,  the  colossal  Farnese  Heracles,  and  the  group  of 
Orestes  and  Electra  in  Naples.  This  last  group  is  a 
good  example  of  the  archaising  tendency  of  the  time. 

It  remains  to  make  mention  of  two  groups  of  the  first 
century  b..c., —  the  Farnese  Bull  in  Naples,  and  the 
Laocoon  group  in  the  Vatican.  Both  of  these  works 
were  by  artists  of  Asia,  the  former  group  by  sculptors 
of  Tralles,  the  latter  of  the  Rhodian  school.  In  the 
choice  of  subjects  and  in  the  scenes  of  cruelty  and  an¬ 
guish  depicted,  so  alien  to  earlier  art,  we  see  the  sculp¬ 
tor’s  desire  to  startle  and  to  shock  the  onlooker. 

The  Laocoon  group  has  world-wide  fame.  Vergil’s 
description  of  the  terrible  death  of  Laocoon  and  his  two 
sons  in  the  coils  of  the  serpents  and,  in  modern  times, 
Lessing’s  essay  Laocoon ,  have  made  the  theme  familiar. 
Judged  by  the  canons  of  classic  Greek  sculpture  the 
Laocoon  group  is  not  deserving  of  its  great  reputation. 
The  subject  chosen,  in  its  excessive  realism,  is  repug¬ 
nant,  and  unsuited  to  sculptural  treatment.  Great 
technical  skill,  however,  is  in  evidence  in  the  group. 

Our  brief  survey  may  appropriately  end  here  as  we 
have  now  come  to  the  period  of  Roman  art  proper. 
Roman  art,  it  is  true,  can  not  be  at  any  time  disasso¬ 
ciated  from  its  Greek  antecedents,  but  there  came  a 
time  when  Roman  influences  dictated  the  subjects 
chosen  for  treatment  and  the  methods  of  their  execu¬ 
tion.  These  subjects  were  mostly  portraits  of  famous 
contemporaries,  reliefs  which  depicted  historical  events, 
and  decorative  reliefs  of  the  Neo-Attic  school. 

We  have  now  rapidly  traced  the  course  of  Greek 
sculpture  through  the  main  periods  of  its  history.  In 
conclusion  let  us  indicate  two  of  its  prominent  charac¬ 
teristics. 

The  art  of  the  Greeks  was  largely  inspired  by  religion 
and  this  religion  was  polytheistic.  Images  of  the  gods 
in  their  various  aspects  and  functions  were  desired  as 
cult  statues  in  temples,  as  embellishment  for  sacred 


62 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


edifices,  and  as  patrons  and  protectors  for  public  and 
private  buildings  and  places.  Greek  humanism  led  the 
Hellenes  to  an  anthropomorphic  conception  of  their 
deities.  Thus  it  is  that  the  Greek  sculptor  embodied 
his  vision  of  divinity  in  the  human  form.  In  Greek 
sculpture,  therefore,  during  the  fifth  and  fourth  cen¬ 
turies  we  see,  for  the  most  part,  the  effort  of  the  artist 
to  mold  the  perfect  human  figure.  The  representation 
of  children,  of  animals,  of  genre  pictures  and  of  the 
comic  element,  and  the  portrayal  of  extreme  realism 
could  not,  and  did  not,  find  general  expression  at  this 
time  when  the  sculptor  was  dominated  by  religious  mo¬ 
tives  and  needs  and  by  his  belief  in  anthropomorphic 
deities.  This  helps  to  explain  idealism  in  Greek  art 
of  the  Age  of  Pericles.  Phidias  and  his  fellows  in  their 
idealized  statues  nobly  materialized  their  conceptions 
of  divine  personages  as  lofty,  benign,  dignified  and 
eternal.  Later  artists,  however,  especially  those  of  the 
fourth  century,  humanized  still  further  their  embodi¬ 
ments  and  endowed  them  with  human  characteristics 
and  emotions.  Their  figures  are  no  longer  types,  they 
are  personalities. 

Another  potent  influence  in  Greek  sculpture  is  athlet¬ 
icism.  In  the  chapter  on  athletics  we  shall  see  the  pop¬ 
ularity  and  importance  of  athletics  in  Greek  life  and  its 
connection  with  Greek  religion.  To  the  victors  in  the 
great  athletic  games  at  Olympia  it  was  customary  to 
dedicate  statues.  This  custom  created  a  great  demand 
for  athletic  statues  and  from  early  times  the  Greek 
sculptor  strove  to  express  the  athletic  ideal.  Athletic 
art  is,  therefore,  an  important  chapter  in  the  history 
of  Greek  sculpture.  Of  the  most  renowned  of  these 
sculptors  —  Myron,  Polyclitus,  and  Lysippus  —  we 
have  spoken  above. 

Later  times  saw  different  tendencies  at  work.  Greek 
art  is  not  perfect  —  nothing  created  by  human  hands 
can  be.  Rut  in  Hellenic  sculpture  at  its  best  are  those 
same  eternal  values  which  are  conspicuous  in  the  archi¬ 
tecture  and  the  literature  of  the  Greeks  —  simplicity, 
proportion,  and  beauty. 


Fig.  39.  The  Doryphorus,  after  Fig.  40.  The  Apoxyomenus,  after  Fig.  41.  The  Discobolus,  after  Myron 

Polyclitus  Lysippus 


CHAPTER  VII 

ATHLETIC  SPORTS  AND  FESTIVALS 


rrAHE  Greek  love  and  practice  of  athletics  are 

I  traits  which  bind  the  modern  world  to  ancient 

JL  Hellas  in  a  sympathetic  bond.  The  Greeks, 
and  no  other  ancient  people,  have  bequeathed  to  us  the 
healthy  tradition  and  the  sound  ideals  of  athleticism  at 
its  best. 

From  the  earliest  times  in  the  Greek  world  we  ob¬ 
serve  the  importance  attached  to  physical  exercise  and 
games.  In  the  poetry  of  Homer  there  are  numerous 
allusions  to  sports  and  descriptions  of  games.  Wrest¬ 
ling  and  boxing  are  favorite  pastimes;  foot-racing, 
throwing  the  discus,  hurling  the  spear,  jumping,  shoot¬ 
ing  the  bow  and  chariot  racing  were  commonly  prac¬ 
ticed.  In  Homer,  too,  ball-playing  was  a  favorite  game 
of  both  girls  and  boys,  but  this  ball-playing  was  by  no 
means  the  strenuous  and  recently  developed  game  be¬ 
loved  by  Americans  of  today;  it  was  rather  a  form  of 
calisthenics  accompanied  by  singing  and  dancing.  In 
the  Sixth  Book  of  the  Odyssey ,  the  princess  Nausicaa 
and  her  maiden  companions,  after  washing  the  gar¬ 
ments  of  the  royal  household  and  refreshing  themselves 
with  bath  and  food,  “  fell  to  playing  at  ball,  casting 
aside  their  head  bands,  and  among  these  Nausicaa  of 
the  white  arms  began  the  song.  .  .  .  Then  the  princess 
threw  the  ball  at  one  of  her  company;  she  missed  the 
girl,  and  cast  the  ball  into  the  deep  eddying  current, 
whereat  they  all  raised  a  piercing  cry.”  In  Book  Eight 
there  is  a  detailed  description  of  this  graceful  game  as 
played  by  Nausicaa ’s  brothers:  “  So  when  they  had 
taken  in  their  hands  the  goodly  ball  of  purple  hue,  that 
cunning  Polybus  had  wrought  for  them,  the  one  would 

63 


64 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


bend  backwards,  and  throw  it  towards  the  shadowy 
clouds;  and  the  other  would  leap  upwards  from  the 
earth  and  catch  it  lightly  in  his  turn,  before  his  feet 
touched  the  ground.  Now  after  they  had  made  trial 
of  throwing  the  ball  straight  up,  the  twain  set  to  dance 
upon  the  bounteous  earth,  tossing  the  ball  from  hand  to 
hand,  and  the  other  youths  stood  by  the  lists  and  beat 
time,  and  a  great  din  arose.”  (Butcher  and  Lang.) 

The  constant  devotion  of  the  Greeks  in  all  periods 
to  athletic  exercises  of  all  kinds  may  be  attributed  to 
their  active  nature  and  lively  temperament,  which 
urged  them  to  the  energetic  use  of  body  and  mind. 
Furthermore,  they  admired  exceedingly  a  sound  body 
and  good  health  with  the  physical  grace  and  comeliness 
which  accompany  good  physique.  The  athletic  ideal 
can  be  observed  everywhere  in  the  masterpieces  of 
Greek  sculpture.  The  great  sculptors,  when  they 
modeled  their  statues  of  youthful  deities  and  ideal 
physical  types,  were  inspired  by  the  splendidly  devel¬ 
oped  athletes  who  graced  the  palaestras.  It  has  been 
well  said  that  “  without  athletics  Greek  art  cannot  be 
conceived.”  The  Greeks  ever  recognized,  too,  the 
value  of  athletics  as  a  preparation  for  the  activities 
of  life  and  the  duties  of  war.  We  find,  therefore, 
that  athletics  were  pursued  not  merely  for  recreation, 
but  as  an  important  and  essential  branch  of  education. 
Consequently,  in  the  scheme  of  Greek  education, 
gymnastics,  or  careful  training  of  the  body,  and  music, 
or  training  of  the  mind,  received  equal  emphasis. 
Athletic  exercises,  too,  were  connected  with  Greek 
religion,  as  may  be  seen,  for  example,  in  the  funeral 
games  celebrated  in  honor  of  the  dead  hero,  e.g., 
Patroclus  in  the  Twenty-third  Book  of  the  Iliad , 
The  great  Panhellenic  athletic  festival  games  were 
founded  in  honor  of  gods  and  were  celebrated  regularly 
as  a  form  of  religious  worship. 

The  essentially  sane  Greek  conception  of  the  pursuit 
of  athletics  should  be  noted  and  is  surely  worthy  of 
modern  imitation.  Physical  culture  was  not  for  a  few 


ATHLETIC  SPORTS  AND  FESTIVALS  65 


specialists  but  for  all.  It  was  not  a  Greek  custom  to 
train  highly  a  few  youths  so  that  hundreds  and  thou¬ 
sands  of  their  fellows  might  sit  idly  by  and  admire  and 
applaud  their  performance.  Competition,  it  is  true, 
was  ever  present,  for  competition  was  at  the  very 
bottom  of  every  Greek  pursuit.  But  it  was  a  healthy 
competition  and  the  resultant  rivalry  contributed  to 
excellence  and  beneficial  results.  The  fame  of  victory, 
or  the  breaking  of  a  record,  did  not  concern  the  Greek 
participant  in  athletics  so  much  as  the  finish  and  grace 
of  his  performance  and  the  perfection  of  his  style. 

While  this  wholesome  pursuit  of  athletics  was  gener¬ 
ally  practiced,  yet  it  is  of  interest  to  observe  an  ex¬ 
ception  which  gradually  grew  and  which  was  repre¬ 
hended  by  several  Greek  thinkers.  This  was  a  tendency 
towards  professionalism  in  connection  with  the  great 
festivals,  especially  at  Olympia,  a  professionalism 
which  was  inevitable  in  the  nature  of  the  case.  The 
contestants  became  so  numerous,  the  rivalry  of  the  rep¬ 
resentatives  of  the  various  Greek  states  so  keen,  and  the 
glory  of  a  triumph  so  great,  that  only  picked  athletes 
after  long  training  as  for  a  profession  had  a  chance 
of  winning.  While  it  is  true  that  the  victor  in  the  great 
games,  as  at  Olympia,  officially  received  no  immediate 
prize  of  intrinsic  value,  the  reward  being  merely  a 
crown  of  gray-green  olive,  celebrated  by  Ruskin,  yet 
success  brought  in  its  train  not  merely  the  adulation 
of  fellow  citizens,  but  a  shower  of  material  blessings. 
For  example,  we  hear  not  only  of  honorary  statues  and 
hymns  of  victory,  but  of  actual  purses  of  money.  At 
Athens  the  Olympian  victor  might  be  given  the  right 
of  free  maintenance  in  the  Prytaneum  and  the  honor  of 
proedria ,  or  the  privilege  of  a  front  seat  at  all  public 
spectacles.  Plato  speaks  of  “  that  life  full  of  bliss  led 
by  Olympian  victors.” 

There  are  several  very  caustic  protests  of  contem¬ 
porary  thinkers  against  this  adulation  and  enrichment 
of  athletic  heroes  of  the  Festival  Games.  Xenophanes 
of  Colophon,  who  flourished  about  500  b.c.  and  who,  in 


66 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


old  age,  taught  and  wrote  in  Elea  in  southern  Italy, 
in  an  extant  elegiac  poem  thus  makes  protest: 

“  But  if  one  should  win  the  victory  by  swiftness  of 
foot  or  in  the  pentathlon  at  Olympia  where  is  the  sacred 
precinct  of  Zeus  by  Pisa’s  waters,  or  in  wrestling  or  in 
hardy  boxing  or  in  that  formidable  contest  called  the 
pankration,  he  would  be  more  renowned  in  the  eyes 
of  his  fellow  citizens  and  would  win  a  conspicuous 
front  seat  at  the  festivals  and  food  from  the  city  at 
public  expense  and  a  gift  of  lasting  value;  and  if  he 
should  be  victor  in  the  chariot-race,  he  would  win  all 
these  rewards  although  being  less  worthy  than  I;  for 
my  wisdom  is  of  greater  value  than  the  strength  of 
men  and  horses.  Nay,  these  matters  are  not  rightly 
regarded ;  to  esteem  physical  strength  more  highly  than 
excellent  wisdom  is  not  right.  For,  even  if  there  should 
be  among  the  people  one  who  is  good  in  boxing  or  in 
the  pentathlon,  or  in  wrestling,  or  in  swiftness  of  foot 
(which  is  the  most  esteemed  of  all  contests),  not  for 
this  reason,  in  truth,  would  the  city  be  better  gov¬ 
erned.  Small  joy  would  there  be  for  a  city,  if  a  man 
win  an  athletic  victory  by  Pisa’s  banks;  this  does  not 
enrich  the  inmost  parts  of  the  city.” 

Even  before  Xenophanes,  Tyrtaeus  (frag,  io)  at 
Sparta  had  disparaged  athletic  excellence  if  this  were 
not  accompanied  by  military  prowess.  When  Socrates, 
on  trial,  is  asked  what  penalty  he  thinks  should  be 
visited  upon  him  he  replies:  “The  reward  of  a  poor 
man  who  is  a  benefactor  of  the  state  —  free  main¬ 
tenance  in  the  Prytaneum.  For  it  is  much  more  be¬ 
coming  that  such  a  man  receive  this  reward  than  the 
Olympian  victor  in  horse-races.  He  confers  upon  you 
the  semblance  of  happiness  and  I  the  reality.  He  does 
not  need  the  support  whereas  I  do.” 

Euripides  in  a  certain  fragment  ( Autolycus ,  284) 
inveighs  with  great  bitterness  against  the  evil  race  of 
athletes  who  know  not  how  to  live,  but  are  the  mere 
slaves  of  their  habits.  He  thinks  that  the  training  of 
the  professional  athlete  does  not  fit  him  for  war  and 


ATHLETIC  SPORTS  AND  FESTIVALS  67 


concludes:  “  It  is  the  wise  and  good  man  who  should 
be  crowned  with  leaves,  the  temperate  and  just  ruler  of 
the  city  who  frees  it  from  evils  by  putting  an  end  to 
contention  and  factions  —  such  deeds  are  beneficial 
to  the  city  and  to  all  Hellas.” 

The  orator  Isocrates  (IV.  1-2)  protests  in  the  same 
strain  thus: 

“  I  have  often  wondered  that  those  who  assemble 
the  great  festivals  and  have  established  athletic  contests 
have  judged  physical  prowess  worthy  of  such  great 
gifts,  yet  reward  with  no  honor  those  who  individually 
toil  for  the  public  welfare  and  discipline  their  souls  so 
as  to  be  able  to  help  others.  Yet  for  the  latter  they 
properly  should  have  had  greater  forethought.  Should 
athletes  acquire  twice  their  normal  strength  no  profit 
to  others  accrues,  but  if  one  man  reveal  wisdom  all 
would  profit  thereby  who  desire  to  share  in  his  under¬ 
standing.” 

It  should  be  noted,  however,  that  these  are  but  the 
protests  of  thinkers  and  writers  who  are  not  decrying 
the  beneficial  physical  culture  everywhere  daily  prac¬ 
ticed  as  an  essential  part  of  education,  but  are  raising 
their  voices  against  the  professionalism  which  was 
creeping  into  the  Panhellenic  Games. 

The  cultivation  of  athletic  exercises  was  of  great 
value  in  still  another  and  very  important  way.  The 
Greeks  were  an  artistic  people  and  were  lovers  of 
beauty.  Now  the  worship  of  beauty  and  the  pursuit 
of  art  if  indulged  to  excess  sometimes  results  in  indo¬ 
lence,  love  of  luxury,  and  enervation,  and  consequent 
effeminacy.  From  this  weakening  of  moral  fiber  the 
Greeks  were  saved  largely  through  their  devotion  to 
wholesome  athletics. 

The  training  school  where  gymnastics  were  practiced 
was  called  the  palaestra ,  literally  wrestling-ground,  and 
was  under  the  direction  of  a  master,  who  is  often  repre¬ 
sented  on  vases  with  his  long  forked  stick.  In  Athens, 
a  palaestra  was  connected  with  a  gymnasium.  A  large 
and  well-equipped  gymnasium  would  contain  a  palaes- 


68 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


tra  with  porticoes,  a  stadium  and  baths,  and  lecture- 
rooms  besides.  Of  these  gymnasia  there  were  three  of 
importance  at  Athens  —  the  Academy,  Lyceum,  and 
Cynosarges  —  all  located  in  sacred  groves  near  streams 
outside  the  walls  of  the  city.  Plato,  with  his  school  of 
philosophy,  has  made  the  Academy  immortal,  while 
Aristotle  used  the  Lyceum  for  his  school  of  the  Peri¬ 
patetics. 

The  large  Stadium  in  Athens  lay  between  two  hills 
to  the  southeast  of  the  Acropolis  and  was  laid  out  by 
Lycurgus  in  the  latter  half  of  the  fourth  century  b.c. 
Here  Herodes  Atticus,  in  the  second  century  a.d.,  con¬ 
structed  seats  of  marble.  The  great  structure  again  has 
been  clothed  in  white  Pentelic  marble,  so  as  to  seat 
some  60,000  spectators,  and  was  used  for  the  revival  of 
the  Olympian  games  and  is  now  employed  for  large 
assemblages. 

The  Festivals 

The  athletic  festivals  of  the  Greeks  are  of  particular 
interest  in  Greek  history  because  of  their  influence  on 
the  life  and  thought  of  the  Hellenes  as  a  whole.  A 
striking  moral  characteristic  was  the  tendency  and  prac¬ 
tice  of  individual  communities  to  stay  by  themselves. 
Segregation  and  isolation  we  find  to  have  been  largely 
the  rule.  Although  the  area  of  Greece  proper  is  small 
and  enemies  from  the  outside  were  ever  a  menace,  yet 
the  Greeks  never  formed  a  stable  federation  of  states 
for  offense  or  defense.  United  action  was  seldom 
achieved.  The  reason  for  this  is  that  the  Greeks  were 
intensely  independent  in  their  nature  and  jealously 
preserved  their  own  individuality  and  complete  free¬ 
dom  of  action.  Although  the  various  peoples  of  Greece 
had  certain  prominent  characteristics  in  common,  yet 
they  differed  widely  in  dialects,  in  political  ideals,  and 
in  social  and  religious  practices.  Boeotian,  Spartan, 
and  Athenian  were  all  Greeks,  but  were  poles  apart 
in  many  respects.  The  physical  character  of  their 
country  —  a  succession  of  mountains,  valleys,  and  gulfs 


ATHLETIC  SPORTS  AND  FESTIVALS  69 


of  the  sea  —  tended  inevitably  to  separate  and  hold 
aloof  the  various  settlements.  Quarrels  and  wars  from 
earliest  times  and  rivalry  for  Hellenic  hegemony  fos¬ 
tered  antipathy  and  chronic  ill-feeling.  Only  two  insti¬ 
tutions,  more  or  less  general,  made  possible  a  national 
feeling,  and  both  of  these  were  primarily  of  religious 
origin  —  the  Amphictyonic  Council  and  the  great  na¬ 
tional  games.  Of  the  former  this  is  not  the  occasion 
to  speak;  we  are  here  concerned  with  the  festival  games. 

Besides  the  local  games  held  at  various  cities,  and 
of  importance  to  them  only,  there  were  four  great 
national  festivals:  The  Olympian,  celebrated  every 
four  years  at  Olympia  in  Elis,  in  honor  of  Zeus;  the 
Pythian,  every  four  years  at  Delphi  in  Phocis,  in  honor 
of  Apollo;  the  Isthmian,  every  two  years  at  the  Isthmus 
of  Corinth,  in  honor  of  Poseidon;  and  the  Nemean, 
every  two  years  at  Nemea  in  the  Peloponnesus,  in  honor 
of  Zeus. 

Of  these  games  the  Olympian  were  by  far  the  most 
important  and  even  Greek  chronology  is  dated  by 
Olympiads  or  intervals  of  four  years.  According  to 
tradition  they  were  founded  by  Heracles,  as  Pindar 
tells  us,  and  were  not  abolished  until  394  a.d.  Regular 
and  continuous  lists  of  victors  were  kept  from  776  b.c. 
and  with  this  year  the  reckoning  by  Olympiads  begins. 
Such  was  their  vitality  that  they  had  a  continued  ex¬ 
istence  of  nearly  1200  years,  notwithstanding  the  pro¬ 
found  political  vicissitudes. 

Olympia  is  in  Elis  in  the  northwestern  part  of  the 
Peloponnesus  near  the  village  of  Pisa,  and  here  a  pre¬ 
cinct  sacred  to  Zeus  was  laid  out  at  the  foot  of  the  hill 
of  Cronos  by  the  river  Alpheus.  In  this  precinct,  or 
Altis,  as  the  Eleans  called  it,  wooded  with  olives  and 
poplars,  were  placed  a  Stadium  and  a  Hippodrome,  and 
buildings  of  all  sorts  were  constructed,  of  which  the 
most  famous  were  the  two  temples  dedicated  to  Zeus 
and  Hera.  Here,  in  the  excavations  conducted  by  the 
Germans  in  1875-1881,  was  found  a  veritable  wilder¬ 
ness  of  ruins  of  temples,  treasuries,  gymnasia  and  altars, 


70 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


together  with  such  magnificent  works  of  art  as  the 
Hermes  of  Praxiteles  and  the  Apollo  from  the  west 
pediment  of  the  Temple  of  Zeus.  The  Alpheus  river, 
and  especially  its  tributary,  the  Cladeus,  which  flowed 
by  the  site,  had  covered  the  whole  precinct  with  some 
fourteen  feet  of  earth,  which  made  the  excavation  so 
difficult  that  the  Stadium  was  not  entirely  cleared. 

The  Olympian  games,  celebrated  every  four  years, 
were  held  in  midsummer  and  lasted  probably  about  five 
days.  Announcement  of  the  approaching  festival  was 
given  some  weeks  before  its  celebration  by  ambassadors 
from  Elis,  who  visited  the  various  states  with  invita¬ 
tions  to  participate  accompanied  by  a  proclamation  of 
a  truce.  The  truce  bound  all  Greeks  to  keep  the  peace 
during  a  period  of  some  three  months,  that  all  might 
attend  without  fear  of  molestation.  Herein  is  seen  an¬ 
other  striking  evidence  of  the  religious  nature  of  the 
festival.  Contestants  for  the  games,  who  qualified  for 
entrance  —  they  must  be  Greeks  by  blood,  free  born, 
and  fit  in  every  way  for  participation  —  trained  at 
Olympia  for  a  period  of  thirty  days. 

The  attendance  at  Olympia  was  enormous.  Visitors 
came  from  all  parts  of  the  Greek  world,  no  matter  how 
remote.  Every  station  in  life  was  represented  and 
every  calling.  People  came  not  only  for  religious  rea¬ 
sons  and  to  view  the  exciting  contests,  but  the  occasion 
afforded  splendid  opportunity  for  personal  and  political 
advertisement  and  display  and  for  material  gain  and 
profit,  but  best  of  all  for  the  exchange  of  ideas.  Thus 
it  was  that  this  great  Panhellenic  festival  served  as  an 
intellectual  clearing-house,  so  to  speak,  where  leading 
representatives  from  the  various  states  could  compare 
their  achievements  and  plan  for  improvements.  This 
meant  much,  especially  for  art  and  literature.  The 
orator  Isocrates  ( Panegyricus ,  43  ff.)  is  our  authority 
on  this  subject:  “  The  founders  of  the  great  festival 
are  justly  praised  because  they  have  handed  down  to 
us  such  a  custom  that  after  making  truces  and  reconcil¬ 
ing  existing  hostilities  we  assemble  in  the  same  place. 


ATHLETIC  SPORTS  AND  FESTIVALS  71 

Here,  after  prayers  and  general  sacrifices,  we  are  re¬ 
minded  of  our  common  and  original  relationship  and 
are  thus  more  amicably  disposed  towards  each  other; 
former  friendships,  too,  are  renewed  and  new  ones  con¬ 
tracted.  .  .  .  Many  blessings  result  from  such  assem¬ 
blies,  of  which  Athens  is  by  no  means  deficient.” 

We  know  that  the  throngs  at  Olympia  were  ad¬ 
dressed  by  the  rhetorician  Gorgias  of  Sicily,  and  by 
the  orator  Lysias.  Isocrates  composed  for  the  Olympic 
festival  his  greatest  speech,  the  Panegyricus ,  urging  a 
united  Greece  against  Persia.  Lucian  affirms  that 
Herodotus  read  his  history  at  Olympia. 

The  festival  consisted  of  two  parts:  first,  the  religious 
ceremonies  with  sacrifices,  feasts,  speeches,  sacred  em¬ 
bassies  and  offerings  to  Zeus  and,  second,  the  contests. 
In  the  fifth  century  b.c.  the  sports  comprised  foot¬ 
races  for  men,  e.g.,  the  dromos  or  stade-race  (600  feet), 
the  diaulos  or  double-stade  run,  the  dolichos,  or  long 
distance  run,  a  distance  of  perhaps  24  stades,  boxing, 
wrestling,  pankration,  pentathlon,  chariot  and  horse¬ 
races,  race  in  armor,  and  boys’  events. 

The  judges  who  supervised  the  games  as  a  whole, 
and  the  separate  contests  as  well,  were  natives  of  Elis, 
originally  two,  and  later,  generally  ten,  and  were  called 
Hellanodicae.  The  sports  lasted  for  several  days  from 
morning  to  night.  A  herald  proclaimed  each  event 
and  later  announced  the  victor,  who  was  crowned  with 
the  olive  wreath  by  the  chief  judge. 

A  very  brief  account  must  suffice  for  the  other  na¬ 
tional  festivals.  Many  of  their  details  were  identical 
with  those  of  the  celebration  at  Olympia;  emphasis 
therefore  will  be  placed  on  divergences. 

The  Pythian  festival  was  founded,  as  the  story  goes, 
to  commemorate  the  victory  of  Apollo  over  the  python. 
The  first  Pythiad  dates  from  582  b.c.  when  the  festival 
was  finally  reorganized.  It  was  celebrated  every  fourth 
year  in  the  August  of  the  third  year  of  each  Olympiad 
and  was  under  the  control  and  supervision  of  the 
HieromnemoneSj  officials  of  the  Amphictyonic  League. 


/ 


72  GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 

The  Pythian  festival  was  originally  devoted  to  musical 
competitions  only,  in  which  the  Hymn  to  Apollo  was  a 
constant  feature,  and  these  were  always  of  greater  im¬ 
portance  than  the  athletic  events.  Considerable  por¬ 
tions  of  a  hymn  to  Apollo  with  the  original  Greek  music 
carved  on  the  Treasury  of  the  Athenians  at  Delphi 
have  been  preserved.1 

Chariot  and  horse-races  were  very  popular  at  the 
Pythian  games  and  attracted  many  entrants.  Forty 
chariots  came  to  grief  in  one  race  as  Pindar  tells  us 
in  one  of  his  Pythian  Odes  ( On  the  Victory  of 
Arcesilas).  In  the  Electra  of  Sophocles  we  have  a 
magnificent  description  of  a  chariot-race  at  Delphi, 
where  Orestes,  one  of  ten  competitors  from  all  Greece, 
is  represented  as  having  met  a  tragic  death.  The  prize 
was  a  wreath  of  laurel  leaves. 

The  Isthmian  games,  celebrated  in  the  spring  of  the 
second  and  fourth  year  of  each  Olympiad,  were  of  lesser 
importance,  although  extremely  popular  and  well  at¬ 
tended  because  of  their  central  location.  At  the 
Nemean  games  athletics  alone  seem  to  have  been  prac¬ 
ticed.  The  prize  at  both  the  Isthmian  and  Nemean 
games  was  a  wreath  of  wild  parsley. 

The  name  of  Pindar  is  eternally  linked  with  the 
great  Greek  festivals.  This  Boeotian  poet,  perhaps  the 
greatest  lyricist  of  ancient  Greece,  celebrated  in  mag¬ 
nificent  verse  in  his  Epinician  Odes ,  or  Songs  of  Victory, 
the  successful  contenders  in  the  four  great  Panhellenic 
games.  Forty-four  of  these  songs  of  praise  are  extant. 
They  are  characterized  by  lofty  beauty,  bold  and  poetic 
diction  and  splendid  imagery.  Unfortunately,  we  can 
never  feel  their  real  power  as  we  lack  the  accompanying 
music,  voices  and  dancing.  Of  the  games  and  Pindar’s 
genius,  Professor  Gildersleeve  (Introduction  to  his  edi¬ 
tion  of  Pindar)  well  says:  “It  is  only  in  accordance 
with  the  principle  of  the  organic  unity  of  Hellenism 
that  the  acme  of  Greek  lyric  art  should  have  embodied 

1  See  Smyth,  Greek  Melic  Poets,  Appendix,  and  Poulsen,  Delphi ,  p.  165. 


ATHLETIC  SPORTS  AND  FESTIVALS  73 


the  acme  of  Greek  festal  life.  The  great  games  of 
Greece  are  as  thoroughly  characteristic  of  her  nation¬ 
ality  as  the  choral  poetry  which  was  the  expression  of 
them  and  the  crown  of  them.”  Simonides  of  Ceos  and 
his  nephew  Bacchylides  were  contemporaries  and  rivals 
of  Pindar  in  the  writing  of  Epinician  odes.  Only  scanty 
fragments  of  this  kind  of  poetry  remain  of  the  former; 
of  the  latter,  there  were  discovered  in  1897  fourteen 
odes  of  victory;  they  are  of  great  interest,  but  of  in¬ 
ferior  poetic  merit  as  compared  with  Pindar. 

Local  games  were  everywhere  held  throughout 
Greece,  and  with  these  we  are  not  here  concerned. 
Especial  mention  must  be  made,  however,  of  the 
Panathenaea ,  the  festival  in  commemoration  of  the 
union  of  Attica  and  in  honor  of  Athena  Polias.  The 
lesser  Panathenaea  were  celebrated  annually  in  July; 
the  greater  every  fourth  year,  in  the  third  year  of  each 
Olympiad.  This  festival  occupied  several  days,  nine 
according  to  Mommsen,  and  comprised  musical  com¬ 
petitions,  athletics,  chariot  and  horse-races,  military 
competitions,  torch-races,  and  boat-races  at  the  Piraeus 
on  the  last  day.  On  the  greatest  day  of  the  festival 
(the  28th  of  the  month)  occurred  the  procession,  so 
admirably  depicted  on  the  frieze  of  the  Parthenon,  and 
the  sacrifices.  At  the  Panathenaea,  musical  competi¬ 
tions  were  very  important  and  consisted  of  contests  in 
singing  and  playing  on  the  lyre  and  on  the  flute,  for 
which  the  prizes  in  the  fourth  century  were  numerous 
and  valuable.  To  the  winners  in  the  contest  in  singing 
to  the  lyre  were  given  a  crown  of  gold  of  the  value  of 
1000  drachmae  (drachma  =  about  18  cents)  and  500 
drachmae  of  silver;  other  prizes  were  purses  of  silver 
of  the  value  of  1200,  600,  400,  and  300  drachmae. 
Lesser  prizes  were  awarded  to  winners  in  the  contest  in 
singing  to  the  flute  and  to  players  on  lyre  and  flute. 

All  the  athletic  events  contested  at  Olympia  found  a 
place  on  the  program  of  the  Panathenaea  and  special 
contests  were  held  for  boys,  youths  and  men.  Two 
prizes,  consisting  of  a  number  of  amphorae  of  olive  oil 


74 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


from  the  sacred  trees  belonging  to  the  State,  were 
awarded  in  the  athletic  contests  and,  in  addition,  there 
was  given  to  the  victor  a  large  and  beautifully  painted 
amphora.  A  large  number  of  these  interesting  Pana- 
thenaic  amphorae  have  survived.  They  are  in  date 
from  the  middle  of  the  sixth  to  the  end  of  the  fourth 
century.  These  vases  are  of  the  black-figured  type  and 
have  as  decoration,  on  one  side  an  athletic  scene  and,  on 
the  other,  Athena  with  aegis,  shield  and  spear.  On 
them  is  regularly  an  inscription,  “  Of  the  prizes  of 
Athens,”  and  sometimes  the  archon’s  name  is  added, 
in  which  case  we  learn  the  date. 

Only  at  Sparta  did  girls  participate  freely  in  athletics 
and  there  they  joined  with  the  boys  in  athletic  exercises 
of  all  kinds.  At  Athens  systematic  physical  culture 
for  girls  was  not  practiced.  Women  attended  the 
Delian  festival  at  Delos  and  at  Chios  wrestled  with 
boys.  Women  and  maidens  form  part  of  the  procession 
of  the  Panathenaea.  At  Olympia,  however,  they  were 
not  allowed  to  attend  the  festival,  this  rule  apparently 
being  due  to  some  early  religious  taboo.  Pausanias 
(v.  1 6)  tells  the  story  of  a  certain  lady,  Pherenice,  who 
attended  the  games  in  the  disguise  of  a  trainer  to  see 
her  son  compete  in  boxing.  Overjoyed  by  his  victory, 
she  jumped  over  the  barrier  and  betrayed  her  sex.  She 
was,  however,  pardoned  because  her  father,  brothers 
and  son  had  all  been  Olympic  victors. 

Women  might  enter  their  horses  in  the  chariot-race 
at  Olympia  and,  if  victorious,  set  up  statues.  There 
was,  too,  a  special  festival  for  women  at  Olympia, 
namely,  the  Heraea,  with  races  for  girls  of  various 
ages.  The  distance  was  500  feet,  one  hundred  feet 
less  than  the  similar  race  for  men.  The  girls  ran  with 
hair  unbound,  a  short  tunic  not  reaching  the  knee,  and 
right  shoulder  bare.  There  is  a  statue  of  a  running  girl 
in  the  Vatican  (Fig.  43),  a  copy  of  a  fifth  century  origi¬ 
nal,  which  exactly  corresponds  to  Pausanias’  description. 
The  prize  in  the  girls’  race  was  a  crown  of  olive  and 
a  share  of  the  ox  sacrificed  to  Hera.  Statues,  too,  they 


ATHLETIC  SPORTS  AND  FESTIVALS  75 


could  set  up  in  the  Heraeum.  This  festival  Pausanias 
asserts  to  be  of  great  antiquity,  founded,  indeed,  by 
Hippodamia  to  commemorate  her  marriage  with  Pelops. 

The  Athletic  Contests 

Even  a  brief  description  of  the  most  popular  and  im¬ 
portant  athletic  contests  of  the  Greeks  should  be  of 
great  interest  to  the  present  outdoor-loving  generation 
as  athletic  exercises  were  never  more  popular  since  the 
days  of  the  ancient  Greeks  than  they  are  today.  For 
a  detailed  account  of  the  various  contests,  with  illustra¬ 
tions  from  the  monuments,  the  reader  should  consult 
E.  N.  Gardiner’s  book  on  Greek  Athletic  Sports  and 
Festivals . 

The  pentathlon  —  the  contest  consisting  of  five 
events  —  comprised  jumping,  discus-throwing,  throw¬ 
ing  the  javelin,  running,  and  wrestling. 

While  the  standing  jump  was  practiced  by  the 
Greeks,  the  running  long  jump  seems  to  have  been  the 
regular  event  in  competition.  In  this  leap  weights 
(, halter es )  of  several  pounds,  of  stone  or  lead,  were 
held  in  the  hands  to  increase  the  momentum  of  the 
jumper.  The  leap  had  to  be  taken  in  good  form,  with 
feet  together,  and  the  contestant  alighted  upon  freshly 
dug  earth. 

The  Homeric  discus  was  of  stone,  but  that  of  later 
times  of  hammered  bronze.  The  discus  varied  in 
weight  and  size,  there  being  different  standards  for  the 
many  games  and  for  the  competitions  of  men  and  boys. 
The  average  ancient  discus  seems  to  have  weighed 
between  four  and  five  pounds  and  an  ancient  notice 
credits  the  athlete  Phayllus  with  a  throw  of  ninety-five 
feet.  In  the  celebrated  statue  of  Myron,  the  Discobo¬ 
lus ,  we  have  a  splendid  illustration  of  the  Greek  athlete 
in  this  event. 

The  javelin  was  about  six  feet  in  length.  It  was 
without  a  point  when  used  in  the  palaestra  and  some¬ 
times  had  a  blunt  metal  cap  at  the  forward  end.  Gen- 


76 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


erally  the  object  of  the  contest  was  for  distance,  al¬ 
though  practice  exercises  for  accuracy  of  throw  were 
also  held.  The  Greek  javelin  was  always  provided 
with  a  thong  or  loop  of  leather  (Latin  amentum)  fixed 
about  midway  of  the  shaft  into  which  the  fingers  of 
the  thrower  were  inserted  at  the  moment  of  hurling. 
The  use  of  this  loop  makes  it  possible  considerably  to 
increase  the  distance  of  the  throw.  In  the  modern 
Olympian  Games  the  amentum  is  not  used.  The  Greek 
javelin- thrower  is  exemplified  for  all  time  by  the  Do- 
ryphorus ,  Polyclitus’  statue  of  a  sturdy  athlete. 

Foot-races  were  of  various  lengths,  e.g.,  of  one,  two, 
four,  and  up  to  twenty-four  stadia.  The  stade-race 
(our  sprint)  was  the  length  of  the  Stadium,  i.e.,  about 
200  yards;  the  diaulos,  twice  the  distance.  The  long¬ 
distance  race  ( dolichos )  varied  as  to  length.  In  the 
Olympian  Games  it  was,  perhaps,  of  24  stadia,  or  about 
three  miles.  Races  in  armor,  too,  were  a  feature  of 
various  games.  Of  especial  interest  to  us  are  the  torch- 
races  which  were  popular  at  various  places  throughout 
Greece,  particularly  at  Athens.  The  torch-race  natu¬ 
rally  took  place  at  night  and  might  be  a  contest  between 
individuals  or  between  teams.  From  Plato’s  Republic 
we  learn  of  a  torch-race  on  horseback,  a  decided 
novelty.  In  the  torch-race  for  individuals  the  contest¬ 
ants  ran  from  the  Academy  into  the  city  and  victory 
was  awarded  to  him  who  first  arrived  with  torch  still 
alight.  In  the  team-race  (our  relay  race)  the  runners 
were  stationed  at  intervals  and  the  torch  was  passed 
from  one  member  of  a  team  to  his  fellow. 

That  wrestling  was  early  very  popular  is  proved  by 
the  Greek  word  for  an  exercise-ground  —  palaestra, 
which  means  wrestling-place.  The  rules  are  uncertain, 
although  there  seem  to  have  been  both  upright  and 
ground-wrestling,  with  three  falls  necessary  for  victory. 
A  fall  on  back,  shoulders,  or  hip  was  a  fair  throw,  and 
tripping  was  permitted. 

No  sport,  however,  is  of  greater  antiquity  and  popu¬ 
larity  than  boxing.  Were  not  Heracles  and  Poly  deuces 


ATHLETIC  SPORTS  AND  FESTIVALS  77 

famous  boxers?  Bare  fists  sometimes  were  used,  but 
generally  a  form  of  “  gloves  ”  was  customary.  In  the 
classical  period  a  soft,  thin  leather  thong  (the  Latin 
cestus)  was  wound  around  each  hand  leaving  the  thumb 
free.  Thus  the  effect  of  a  blow  was  softened.  But  a 
more  formidable  “  glove  ”  came  into  use,  a  strip  of  thick 
hard  leather  which  stood  out,  with  sharp  edges,  from 
the  hand.  Finally,  in  Roman  times,  for  bloody  gladia¬ 
torial  use,  a  barbarous  “  loaded  ”  cestus  was  intro¬ 
duced,  when  a  strip  of  metal  was  buried  in  the  leather 
strap.  In  Greek  boxing  it  would  seem  that  blows 
were  aimed  at  the  head,  and  no  formal  rules,  as  in 
modern  times,  with  ring  and  rounds,  governed  the  com¬ 
bat.  The  fight  was  fought  to  a  finish  and  the  defeated 
boxer  was  “  knocked  out  ”  or  held  up  his  hand  in  token 
of  defeat. 

The  pankration  (literally,  all-strength  contest)  was 
a  combination  of  wrestling  and  boxing,  the  cestus  not 
being  used.  This  contest,  not  known  to  Homer,  was  a 
feature  of  the  Olympian  games  and  victorious  pankra- 
tiasts  are  eulogized  in  eight  of  the  odes  of  Pindar. 
While  the  pankration  seems  to  us  the  roughest  of  Greek 
athletic  sports,  yet  it  was  regulated  by  definite  rules. 
Hitting,  wrestling,  and  kicking  were  permitted,  as  also 
the  strangle  hold.  But  such  unfair  tactics  as  biting 
or  gouging  (i.e.,  the  digging  of  finger  or  hand  into  the 
eye  or  vulnerable  part  of  the  opponent’s  body)  were 
forbidden.  The  combat  started  with  the  contestants 
facing  each  other  standing;  it  ended  on  the  ground  with 
the  vanquished,  as  in  wrestling,  holding  up  his  hand  in 
token  of  defeat. 

In  all  these  contests,  as  pictured  on  the  vases,  the 
rules  were  administered  by  an  umpire,  an  older  man, 
who  is  represented  as  standing  by  in  an  attitude  of 
close  attention,  holding  outstretched  a  long  forked 
stick  with  which  to  punish  infractions  of  the  regula¬ 
tions. 

Horse-races  were,  of  course,  of  great  popularity. 
Vase  paintings  and  coins  show  single  riders  and  two-  and 


78 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


four-horse  chariots.  We  see  jockeys  guiding  their  gal¬ 
loping  mounts  with  bridles,  but  riding  without  saddle 
or  stirrups.  The  chariot-races  in  the  hippodrome  were 
splendid  and  exciting  events.  The  element  of  danger 
was  ever  present  as  the  competing  chariots  were  gener¬ 
ally  numerous  and  the  risk  of  upset  and  collision,  par¬ 
ticularly  at  the  frequent  turns  around  the  terminal 
pillars,  was  very  great.  Reference  has  already  been 
made  to  the  magnificent  description  in  Sophocles’ 
Electra  of  a  tragic  chariot-race. 

Wrestlers,  hockey-players,  charioteers,  and  athletes 
exercising  are  admirably  depicted  on  sculptured  bases 
recently  found  in  Athens. 


CHAPTER  VIII 


POLITICAL,  SOCIAL,  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  OF 

THE  ATHENIAN  PEOPLE 

“  The  first  valuable  contribution  the  Greeks  made  to  political 
study  was  that  they  invented  it.”  —  A.  E.  Zimmern. 

“  The  small  city  communities  of  Greece  created  the  intellectual 
life  of  Europe.  In  their  literature  we  find  models  of  thought  and 
expression,  and  meet  the  subtle  and  powerful  personalities  who 
originated  for  Europe  all  forms  of  poetry,  history  and  philosophy, 
and  even  physical  science  itself,  no  less  than  the  ideal  of  freedom 
and  the  conception  of  a  self-governing  democracy;  while  the 
student  is  introduced  to  the  great  problems  of  thought  and  life 
at  their  springs,  before  he  follows  them  through  the  wider  but 
more  confused  currents  of  the  modern  world.”  —  From  a  public 
statement  signed  by  distinguished  Englishmen. 

IN  THIS  chapter  it  is  proposed  to  discuss  the 
population  of  Attica,  the  various  elements  and 
classes  constituting  Athenian  society,  and  the 
political,  social,  and  economic  status  and  life  of  the 
inhabitants  in  the  latter  half  of  the  fifth  century  b.c* 
It  is  impossible  to  ascertain  the  exact  population  of 
Attica,  as  there  are  no  authoritative  figures  which  in¬ 
clude  all  the  inhabitants.  It  is  true  that  various  official 
lists  were  kept.  Each  tribe,  for  example,  entered  in  a 
register  the  names  of  all  children  born  of  citizen 
parents;  there  was,  too,  a  list  of  all  male  citizens  who 
were  eligible  to  vote  in  the  assembly;  and,  finally, 
citizens  between  the  ages  of  eighteen  and  sixty  who 
were  liable  to  service  in  the  cavalry  or  heavy-armed 
infantry  were  registered.  No  accurate  census,  how¬ 
ever,  was  ever  taken  of  all  the  elements  forming  the 
population,  which  comprised  the  citizens,  the  for¬ 
eign  population  (the  resident  aliens,  or  metics  as 
they  were  called),  and  the  slaves.  Furthermore,  an 
estimate  of  the  population  is  made  more  uncertain 

79 


80 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


by  reason  of  the  fact  that  it  was  subject  to  severe 
fluctuation  as  to  numbers,  due  to  the  sending  out  of 
colonies;  the  high  death-rate  which  was  normally 
perhaps  double  that  of  the  United  States;  the  great 
plague  of  430  b.c.  which  killed  almost  one  quarter 
of  the  inhabitants  of  Attica;  the  constant  wars  with 
their  ravages,  such  as  the  steady  drain  on  the  Athenian 
fighting  forces  in  the  protracted  Peloponnesian  War; 
and  the  ill-starred  Sicilian  expedition  of  413  b.c. 
On  the  basis  of  all  the  information  available  it 
has  been  estimated  that  the  total  population  of 
Athens  and  Attica  at  about  the  year  431  b.c.  was 
between  300,000  and  400,000  persons.  These  con¬ 
sisted  of:  adult  male  citizens ,  between  40,000  and 
55,000,  and  with  their  wives  and  children  far  above 
100,000;  resident  aliens  or  metics,  14,000  to  24,000, 
with  their  families  perhaps  50,000;  slaves,  adult  males, 
perhaps  50,000.  To  the  citizen  of  a  modern  state 
which  stretches  across  a  continent  and  numbers  its 
inhabitants  by  tens  of  millions  it  is  indeed  a  revelation 
to  learn  what  great  and  eternal  achievements  were  won 
by  a  population  so  small  and  inhabiting  a  district  so 
insignificant  in  area. 

Under  what  conditions  did  this  population  live, 
politically,  socially,  and  economically?  The  majority 
of  the  numerous  books  which  deal  with  Athenian 
political  and  social  life  in  the  latter  part  of  the  fifth 
century  b.,c.  convey  to  the  reader  the  general,  but  em¬ 
phatic,  impression  that  Athens,  while  theoretically  a 
democracy,  was,  generally  speaking,  an  aristocracy. 
In  fact,  the  traditional  view  of  Athens  under  Pericles 
reveals  a  society  brilliant  in  its  achievements,  but  quite 
selfishly  constituted,  and  gravel}  defective,  save  from 
the  viewpoint  of  the  favored  few.  Profound  social  dis¬ 
tinctions,  even  among  the  citizens  themselves,  are  in¬ 
sisted  upon.  The  conception  still  is  widely  prevalent 
that  the  elite  of  Athenian  society,  few  but  fit,  led  a 
life  of  glorious,  but  intensely  selfish,  leisure,  which  was 
their  prerogative  as  the  result  of  the  ruthless  exploita- 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  81 


tion  of  all  professional  men,  artists,  producers,  traders, 
artisans,  workers,  resident  aliens,  and  slaves.  Almost 
everywhere  the  time-honored  assertion  is  made  that 
in  Athens  all  work  was  despised,  labor  was  contemned, 
the  workers  were  disdained,  and,  in  fact,  that  any  ser¬ 
vice  for  which  financial  remuneration  was  received  was 
in  disrepute  and  branded  the  doer  with  a  humiliating 
social  stigma.  The  free  man  is  supposed  to  have  done 
little  or  no  work,  for  surely  the  aristocratic  citizen  must 
have  had  a  completely  independent  and  care-free  exist¬ 
ence  for  his  manifold  political,  social,  and  religious 
duties. 

It  may  well  be  asked,  why  is  it  that  this  view  of 
Athenian  society  as  intensely  aristocratic,  if  erroneous, 
is  generally  held?  The  reasons  are,  it  would  seem,  as 
follows:  (i)  Athens,  like  other  Greek  states,  at  an 
early  period  in  its  history,  in  fact,  until  after  Solon  and 
Clisthenes,  was,  in  large  measure,  oligarchic  and  aris¬ 
tocratic,  both  politically  and  socially.  It  is  mistakenly 
assumed  that  these  early  conditions,  particularly  in  so¬ 
cial  life,  continued.  (2)  Certain  Greek  states,  e.g., 
Sparta,  Thebes,  and  Crete,  never  experienced  democ¬ 
ratization.  The  strictly  aristocratic  conditions  which 
were  permanently  characteristic  of  these  states  are 
sometimes  thought  of  as  necessarily  existing  also  in 
Athens.  (3)  Modern  writers  have  the  tendency  im¬ 
plicitly  to  follow  Plato  and  Aristotle  as  authorities  and 
imagine  that  actual  fifth  century  Athenian  conditions 
are  accurately  reflected  in  the  pages  of  these  philoso¬ 
phers,  even  when  the  latter  are  discussing  theoretical 
polities  and  imaginary  and  ideal  societies.  And  yet 
caution  must  always  be  observed  in  the  case  of  these 
“  Laconizing  ”  theorizers  who,  furthermore,  were  aris¬ 
tocrats  and  in  many  respects  distrusted  democracy. 
(4)  It  is  true  that  Athens  was  not  a  democracy  in  the 
complete  sense  of  the  word,  inasmuch  as  the  vote  was 
denied  to  women,  foreigners,  and  slaves.  Slavery  was, 
of  course,  a  recognized  institution  from  time  imme¬ 
morial  throughout  the  ancient  world  and  Athens  as  well. 


82 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


I.  The  Citizens 

So  far  as  native  males  were  concerned  Athens  was 
politically  a  perfect  democracy.  We  are  fortunate  in 
having  no  less  an  authority  than  Pericles  himself  to 
testify  for  us  —  Pericles,  the  aristocrat,  in  the  immortal 
Funeral  Oration ,  as  reported  in  the  second  book  of  the 
history  of  Thucydides,  the  aristocrat.  “  Our  govern¬ 
ment  is  not  copied  from  those  of  our  neighbors;  we 
are  an  example  to  them  rather  than  they  to  us.  Our 
constitution  is  named  a  democracy,  because  it  is  in  the 
hands  not  of  the  few  but  of  the  many.  Our  laws  secure 
equal  justice  for  all  in  their  private  disputes,  and  our 
public  opinion  welcomes  and  honors  talent  in  every 
branch  of  achievement,  not  for  any  sectional  reason, 
but  on  grounds  of  excellence  alone.  And  as  we  give 
free  play  to  all  in  our  public  life,  so  we  carry  the  same 
spirit  into  our  daily  relations  with  one  another.  We 
are  obedient  to  whomsoever  is  set  in  authority,  and  to 
the  laws,  more  especially  to  those  which  offer  protec¬ 
tion  to  the  oppressed  and  those  unwritten  ordinances 
whose  transgression  brings  admitted  shame.  Wealth  to 
us  is  not  mere  material  for  vainglory,  but  an  oppor¬ 
tunity  for  achievement,  and  poverty  we  think  is  no 
disgrace  to  acknowledge,  but  a  real  degradation  to  make 
no  effort  to  overcome.  Our  citizens  attend  both  to  pub¬ 
lic  and  private  duties,  and  do  not  allow  absorption  in 
their  own  various  affairs  to  interfere  with  their  know¬ 
ledge  of  the  city’s.  We  differ  from  other  states  in  re¬ 
garding  the  man  who  holds  aloof  from  public  life,  not 
as  quiet  but  as  useless.  In  a  word,  I  claim  that  our  city 
as  a  whole  is  an  education  to  Greece,  and  that  her 
members  yield  to  none,  man  by  man,  for  independence 
of  spirit,  many-sidedness  of  attainment  and  complete 
self-reliance  in  limbs  and  brain.”  (See  A.  E.  Zimmern, 
The  Greek  Commonwealth ,  Part  II.,  chapter  VIII). 

From  this  speech  it  is  seen  that  in  Athens,  if  not  in 
Sparta  and  Plato’s  Republic ,  the  State  existed  for  the 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  83 


individual  and  not  the  individual  for  the  State.  The 
actual  facts  as  we  definitely  know  them  clearly  reveal 
Athens  as  a  political  democracy  to  a  degree  greater  even 
than  is  possible  for  us  today.  Athens  was  a  small  com¬ 
munity  and  allowed  all  citizens  directly  to  participate 
in  the  government,  whereas  in  our  great  modern  demo¬ 
cratic  states  authority  must  be  delegated  by  govern¬ 
ment  through  representatives.  All  citizens  over  eigh¬ 
teen  years  of  age  were  members  of  the  Athenian  As¬ 
sembly;  all  citizens  over  thirty  were  eligible  to  mem¬ 
bership  in  the  Council  of  Five  Hundred,  the  members 
of  which  were  elected  annually  by  lot;  and  all  citizens 
over  thirty  were  eligible  to  election  by  lot  to  serve  as 
jurymen  in  the  Heliastic  law-courts.  The  practice  of 
filling  offices  by  election  by  lot  may  not  commend  itself 
as  the  best  means  to  secure  efficient  officers,  but  it  is 
eloquent  proof  of  political  equality,  showing  that  class 
distinction  of  any  kind  was  not  prejudicially  operative. 
Furthermore,  that  lack  of  means  might  not  prevent 
participation  in  public  service,  Pericles  introduced  the 
system  of  a  small  financial  remuneration  for  office¬ 
holders. 

The  Athenian  Assembly,  or  Ecclesia  as  it  was 
called,  was  composed,  as  has  been  said,  of  all  citizens 
over  eighteen  years  of  age.  The  attendance  was  volun¬ 
tary  and  there  was  no  compensation  during  the  fifth  cen¬ 
tury;  pay  was  introduced  in  the  fourth  century.  The 
sessions  were  originally  held  in  the  agora  or  market 
place,  but  the  regular  place  of  meeting  was  the  hill 
called  the  Pnyx;  later  the  theater  of  Dionysus  built  by 
Lycurgus  afforded  a  more  comfortable  location.  The 
Assembly  convened  only  once  in  a  prytany  or  tenth 
of  the  year  period,  but  met  more  frequently  as  time 
went  on,  as  often  as  four  times  in  each  prytany. 
The  legislative  powers  of  the  Assembly  were  great 
and  determined  matters  of  policy  and  administration, 
involving  questions  of  war  and  peace,  treaties  and 
alliances,  the  raising  of  military  forces  and  their 
dispersal,  and  finances.  The  election  of  generals 


84 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


and  some  others  of  the  most  important  public  officers 
devolved  upon  the  Assembly.  In  the  regular  order  of 
business  of  the  Assembly  there  was  first  a  considera¬ 
tion  of  the  program  provided  by  the  Council,  i.e.,  those 
preliminary  decrees  or  proposals  recommended  by  that 
body.  Voting  was  by  a  show  of  hands.  In  cases  of 
ostracism  the  voting  took  the  form  of  inscribing  the 
name  of  the  proposed  victim  on  ostraka  or  potsherds. 
The  decrees  passed  by  the  Assembly  which  had  been 
recommended  by  the  Senate  were  inscribed  on  stone 
or  bronze  and  were  exposed  to  public  view.  Any  mem¬ 
ber  of  the  Assembly  was  at  liberty  to  speak,  although 
custom  and  modesty  prescribed  that  precedence  should 
depend  upon  age,  older  citizens  speaking  first.  As  in 
all  popular  assemblies  a  few  men  did  most  of  the  speak¬ 
ing,  assuming  leadership  through  their  oratorical  gifts, 
special  knowledge,  or  interest.  Professional  orators 
{rhetors)  held  sway  over  the  populace  for  better  or 
worse. 

The  Council  of  Five  Hundred  was  made  up  of  citi¬ 
zens  over  thirty  years  of  age  who  had  been  chosen  by 
lot,  fifty  from  each  of  the  ten  tribes.  Members  were 
elected  annually  and  could  serve  not  more  than  twice. 
The  qualifications  of  each  new  elected  councillor  were 
passed  upon  (the  dokimasia )  by  the  outgoing  Council. 
Pay  of  three  obols  a  day  (nine  cents)  was  awarded 
members  since  their  duties  demanded  all  their  time,  the 
Council  meeting  daily  in  the  Council-chamber  except 
during  the  festivals.  For  the  expedition  of  business 
the  fifty  members  from  each  tribe  in  turn  constituted 
a  committee  which  was  responsible  for  the  preparation 
of  business  and  was  always  available  for  the  immediate 
handling  of  affairs.  These  were  called  the  prytanes  or 
presidents  and  held  office  for  the  tenth  part  of  the  year, 
meeting  in  a  special  building,  the  circular  Tholos,  where 
they  took  their  meals.  The  chief  duty  of  the  Council 
was  to  prepare  business  for  the  Assembly  and  there¬ 
after  to  execute,  if  requested,  the  decrees  favorably 
acted  by  that  body.  It  had  also  numerous  powers  of 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  85 


administration,  control  of  magistrates,  and  certain 
religious  and  judicial  functions. 

The  Council  of  the  Areopagus,  composed  of  ex- 
archons  holding  office  for  life,  originally  had  enjoyed 
great  political  powers,  but  these  were  curtailed  by  the 
reforms  of  Ephialtes  and  Pericles.  It  became  thereafter 
merely  a  court  supervising  certain  matters  of  religion 
and  law,  cases  of  homicide,  in  particular,  being  fre¬ 
quently  tried  before  it. 

Of  great  importance  in  Athenian  government  were 
the  Magistrates.  These  officials  were  of  three  classes 
according  to  their  duties,  administrative,  military,  and 
financial.  The  chief  administrative  officers  were  the 
Nine  Ar chons,  consisting  of  the  Chief  Archon  ( Archon 
Eponymus) ,  who  in  records  gave  his  name  to  the  year; 
the  King  Archon  ( Archon  Basileus ),  who  had  general 
charge  of  religious  matters;  the  Polemarch ,  who  was 
originally  Commander-in-chief,  but  later,  being  super¬ 
seded  by  the  ten  generals,  he  was  given  various  judicial 
duties,  especially  jurisdiction  over  the  resident  aliens 
or  metics;  and  finally  the  six  Junior  Archons,  the  Thes- 
mothetae ,  who  recommended  revision  of  laws  and 
served  as  presiding  officers  of  the  law-courts. 

The  Ten  Generals  were  the  most  influential  officers 
in  Athens.  Originally  each  of  the  ten  tribes  appointed 
a  general;  later  all  ten  were  elected  by  the  citizens  at 
large.  They  were  in  charge  of  all  military  and  naval 
administration  and  operations  and  of  foreign  affairs 
generally.  Of  equal  powers  and  responsibilities  in  the 
beginning,  they  were  eventually  assigned  specific  duties. 
They  influenced  legislation  in  Council  and  Assembly 
and  could  submit  motions.  Under  them  were  subordi¬ 
nate  infantry  and  cavalry  officers.  Special  and  extraor¬ 
dinary  powers  might  be  granted  to  a  particular  general, 
who  would  thus  become  virtual  ruler  of  Athens.  This 
was  true  in  the  case  of  Pericles,  a  general,  appointed 
year  after  year,  and  nominally  subject  constitutionally 
to  higher  authority,  and  yet  in  effect  beneficent  tyrant 


86 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


of  Athens  for  many  years  because  of  the  enormous 
power  and  influence  which  he  exerted  as  general. 

Financial  Officers  consisted  of  various  boards  of 
treasurers,  tax  officials,  and  stewards  of  funds. 

The  Law-Courts  in  Athens  are  of  peculiar  interest, 
as  the  Athenian  legal  system  differed  widely  from  our 
own.  These  courts,  called  Heliastic,  drew  their  dicasts 
(jurors)  for  jury  service  from  a  list  of  six  thousand 
citizens.  These  men,  usually  of  advanced  years,  had 
volunteered  for  such  service  and  were  chosen  by  lot, 
600  from  each  tribe.  The  size  of  juries  was  extraor¬ 
dinarily  large,  ranging  from  201  to  a  possible  6000,  de¬ 
pending  upon  the  importance  of  the  case.  The  pay 
of  jurymen  for  service  was  two  obols  (six  cents)  a  day. 

The  established  facts  concerning  the  government  of 
Athens  and  the  relations  of  the  citizens  thereto  show 
the  essential  democracy  of  Athenian  political  institu¬ 
tions  in  the  period  under  consideration.  There  was 
complete  political  equality  among  the  citizens  regard¬ 
less  of  poverty,  wealth,  family,  occupation,  and  pres¬ 
tige.  Citizenship  was  enjoyed  by  all  of  Athenian  birth 
and  might  be  extended,  as  it  was  in  some  cases,  to 
metic,  or  to  slave.  The  Assembly  was  composed,  as 
Xenophon  and  Plato  tell  us,  largely  of  fullers,  cobblers, 
carpenters,  smiths,  farmers,  and  wholesale  and  retail 
dealers.  Offices  were,  for  the  most  part,  filled  by  lot, 
and  payment  for  public  service  made  it  possible  for 
the  poorer  classes  to  serve.  Naturally,  the  superior 
virtues,  abilities  and  qualifications  of  a  Pericles  or  a 
Demosthenes  made  him  conspicuous  in  the  affairs  of 
government  and  gave  him  great  power  for  the  good  of 
Athens.  On  the  other  hand,  a  democratic  form  of 
government  has  in  its  very  nature  inherent  weaknesses 
and  potential  dangers,  since  it  is  always  possible  for 
men  of  great  ability  but  of  dishonest  character  to  pur¬ 
sue  their  selfish  ends.  These  dangers  Athens  did  not 
wholly  escape.  Just  as  in  modern  democracies,  espe¬ 
cially  in  municipal  government,  demagogues,  bosses, 
and  venal  professional  politicians  often  came  into  power 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  87 

to  the  despair  and  hurt  of  honest  citizens,  so  in  Athens 
there  inevitably  arose  unscrupulous  demagogues  such 
as  Cleon,  venal  statesmen,  like  Aeschines,  professional 
politicians,  like  certain  rhetors,  informers  and  black¬ 
mailers,  like  the  sycophants,  and  oligarchical  cliques 
in  successive  generations,  e.g.,  the  pro-Medes,  the  pro- 
Lacedaemonians,  and  the  pro-Macedonians.  Some  of 
the  great  Athenian  thinkers,  even  Plato  and  Aristotle, 
seeing  these  defects  and  fearing  that  the  democracy 
with  all  its  advantages  might  degenerate  into  an  ochloc¬ 
racy  (mob-rule),  disparage  a  democratic  polity  and 
eulogize  the  aristocracy  or  the  benevolent  monarchy. 
But  they  were  on  the  wrong  track.  The  political  salva¬ 
tion  and  personal  independence  of  mankind  is  to  be 
achieved,  as  the  majority  of  thinking  men  today  be¬ 
lieve,  only  through  “  a  government  of  the  people,  by 
the  people,  and  for  the  people.”  The  Athenian  ideal  of 
2300  years  ago  is  our  ideal.  It  was  not  completely 
realized  by  them  and  it  has  not  been  perfectly  achieved 
by  us  today.  But  their  ideals  are  ours.  Their  suc¬ 
cesses  we  should  emulate;  their  failures  we  should 
avoid.  In  both  respects  Athens  remains  our  teacher 
and  our  benefactor. 

We  are  now  ready  to  examine  the  social  and  eco¬ 
nomic  status  of  citizens  in  Athenian  life  and  to  scruti¬ 
nize  it  particularly  for  evidences  of  caste,  snobbery,  in¬ 
equality  and  injustice. 

In  the  city  the  house  of  the  rich  man  and  that  of 
the  poor  man  differed  little  in  appearance.  Private 
unostentation  as  contrasted  with  public  magnificence 
was  the  rule.  In  fact,  it  was  considered  a  breach  of 
good  taste  to  build  and  occupy  a  house  of  conspicuous 
cost  or  size.  In  the  next  place,  simplicity  in  dress  was 
general.  Only  the  young  (and,  in  particular,  the 
Knights)  dared  to  provoke  possible  derision  or  to  invite 
popular  prejudice  by  foppery  of  attire  or  appearance. 
Young  Mantitheus,  in  an  oration  of  Lysias,  apologizes 
to  the  Senate  for  his  long  hair,  and  Strepsiades,  the  old 


88 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


farmer  in  Aristophanes7  Clouds ,  is  disgusted  with  his 
son7s  “  dandyism.77  Wearing  the  hair  long  might 
arouse  suspicion  of  Spartan  or  aristocratic  sympathies. 
An  ancient  witness  testifies  that  “  the  Athenian  people 
are  not  better  clothed  than  the  slave  or  alien,  nor  in 
personal  appearance  is  there  any  superiority.77  Of 
course  the  nature  of  the  employment  might  influence 
the  quality  and  nature  of  the  costume. 

In  all  forms  of  social  activity  all  the  citizens  partici¬ 
pated  on  a  parity.  All  could  attend  the  theater;  all 
joined  in  the  public  festivals  and  in  religious  sacrifices 
and  observances.  The  poor  and  lowly  enjoyed  great 
advantages  and  privileges.  Listen  to  the  testimony  of 
that  unregenerate  old  Aristocrat  (just  quoted)  who  is 
bitterly  opposed  to  Democracy  as  an  institution  but 
admits  that  it  really  exists  in  Athens.  He  says  that  if 
you  must  have  Democracy,  Athens  is  a  perfect  example 
of  it:  “  I  do  not  praise  the  Polity  of  the  Athenians,  be¬ 
cause  the  very  choice  involves  the  welfare  of  the  baser 
folk  as  opposed  to  that  of  the  better  class.  The  poorer 
classes  and  the  people  of  Athens  should  have  the  ad¬ 
vantage  over  the  men  of  birth  and  wealth  because  it 
is  the  people  who  row  the  vessels,  and  put  around  the 
city  her  girdle  of  power.  Everywhere  greater  consider¬ 
ation  is  shown  to  the  base,  to  poor  people,  and  to  com¬ 
mon  folk,  than  to  persons  of  good  quality  —  this  should 
not  surprise  us,  this  is  the  keystone  of  the  preserva¬ 
tion  of  the  democracy.  It  is  these  poor  people,  this 
common  folk,  this  riff-raff,  whose  prosperity,  combined 
with  growth  of  their  numbers,  enhance  the  democracy. 
All  the  world  over  the  cream  of  society  is  in  opposition 
to  the  democracy.  The  objection  may  be  raised  that 
it  was  a  mistake  to  allow  the  universal  right  of  speech 
and  a  seat  in  council ;  privileges  which  should  have  been 
reserved  for  the  cleverest,  the  flower  of  the  community. 
But  if  only  the  better  people  sat  in  council,  blessings 
would  fall  only  to  that  class  and  the  baser  folk  would 
get  nothing.  Whereas  it  is  the  other  way  round.  The 
people  desire  to  be  free  and  to  be  masters  and  their  bad 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  89 


legislation  is  the  very  source  of  the  people’s  strength 
and  freedom.”  The  happy  lot  of  the  common  people 
in  ancient  Athens  is  further  described  by  this  contem¬ 
porary  witness:  “  The  rich  man  trains  the  chorus;  it 
is  the  people  for  whom  the  chorus  is  trained.  The 
rich  man  is  trierarch  or  gymnasiarch  and  the  people 
profit  by  their  labors.  The  whole  state  sacrifices  at 
public  cost  a  large  number  of  victims;  the  Attic  Democ¬ 
racy  keeps  holiday.  They  build  at  public  cost  a  num¬ 
ber  of  palaestras,  dressing-rooms,  bathing  establish¬ 
ments;  the  mob  gets  the  benefit  of  the  majority  of 
these  luxuries  rather  than  the  select  few  or  the  well-to- 
do.  In  the  theater  the  people  do  not  like  to  be  carica¬ 
tured  in  comedy;  it  is  the  wealthy  or  well-born  or  in¬ 
fluential  man  who  is  lampooned.”1 

The  essential  simplicity  and  sufficiency  of  life  in 
Athens  is  in  striking  and  refreshing  contrast  with  the 
extremes  of  luxury  and  poverty  which  characterize 
Rome  of  the  first  century  a.d.  and  the  world  today. 
In  Athens,  the  rich  did  not  grow  richer  while  the  poor 
grew  poorer.  Great  fortunes,  as  we  know  them  and  as 
the  Romans  knew  them,  were  not,  and  could  not  be,  ac¬ 
cumulated.  It  is  true  that  some  men  were  wealthier 
than  others  and  enjoyed  certain  superior  advantages 
as  a  result,  but  there  was  no  overwhelming  disparity 
between  rich  and  poor  in  matters  of  dress  and  house, 
food  and  drink,  and  in  physical,  mental  and  spiritual 
joys  and  relaxations.  Surplus  wealth  was  not  at  the 
disposal  of  the  few,  but  was  expended  for  the  good  of 
all.  Funds  from  the  public  treasury  provided  the 
marble  temples,  buildings  and  the  theater  and  likewise 
supported  war-orphans  and  pensioned  invalids. 

Individuals  who  acquired  greater  means  than  their 
fellows  were  expected  to  use  it  for  the  good  of  the  city 
as  a  whole.  This  was  accomplished  through  the  litur¬ 
gies  or  public  services,  which  may  be  compared  with 
modern  income  taxes.  This  interesting  financial  in- 

1  Polity  of  the  Athenians  (translated  by  Dakyns),  composed  about 
425  b.c.,  falsely  attributed  to  Xenophon. 


90 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


stitution  peculiar  to  ancient  Greece  merits  attention. 
The  revenue  which  accrued  from  the  Athenian  system 
of  indirect  taxation  was  quite  insufficient  to  defray  the 
expense  of  government.  This  taxation  took  the  form 
of  certain  customs  duties,  income  from  public  lands 
and  mines,  fines,  confiscations,  dues  and  licenses  and 
personal  taxes  on  metics,  all  of  which  were  largely  col¬ 
lected  by  tax-farmers.  In  place  of  direct  taxation  as 
a  means  of  obtaining  public  revenue  —  a  method  which 
was  rejected  by  the  Athenians  as  they  regarded  it  as 
an  infringement  upon  personal  liberty  —  through  the 
liturgies,  wealthy  citizens  were  called  upon  to  support 
by  money  and  personal  service  various  public  activities. 
Some  of  these  liturgies  were:  the  trier  archia,  the  equip¬ 
ment  of  the  naval  fleet;  the  choregia ,  or  the  equipment 
and  payment  of  all  expenses  of  a  chorus  in  the  dramatic 
and  religious  festivals;  and  the  gymnasiarchia,  or  ser¬ 
vice  through  which  races  of  all  kinds  were  provided. 
There  were  numerous  other  minor  liturgies  and  special 
occasions  and  taxes  which  made  demands  upon  the 
wealthy.  The  amount  of  some  of  these  contributions 
is  of  interest.  For  example,  the  expense  of  a  choregus 
in  tragedy  might  be  3000  drachmas  (drachma  =  about 
18  cents);  in  comedy,  1600  drachmas.  Lysias  tells  of 
a  man  who  spent  during  the  years  41 1—403  b.c.  some 
63,000  drachmas  on  the  performance  of  liturgies,  or 
an  average  of  over  7000  drachmas  a  year. 

While  liturgies  were  imposed  by  the  state  upon  the 
wealthier  citizens,  these  tax  burdens  were  often  vol¬ 
untarily  assumed  out  of  term  for  many  years  in  succes¬ 
sion  by  the  more  generous  and  public-spirited  who  con¬ 
tributed  also  to  special  funds  at  times  of  public  need. 
This  interest  in  public  welfare  in  ancient  Athens  and 
private  generosity  may  be  compared  with  the  frequent 
large  gifts  made  by  public-spirited  men  in  the  modern 
world,  especially  in  America. 

But  what  was  the  social  and  economic  position  of 
Athenian  citizen  workers  of  various  kinds?  As  has 
been  stated,  it  is  generally  asserted  that  all  work  was 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  91 


regarded  as  degrading,  that  every  activity  for  which 
one  was  paid  was  condemned,  and  that  producers,  arti¬ 
sans,  and  all  workers  were  branded  by  a  humiliating 
social  stigma.  No  adequate  proof  of  such  a  condition 
of  affairs  is  forthcoming.  Why,  then,  is  there  this  gen¬ 
eral  mistaken  notion?  It  is  probably  because  of  certain 
pronouncements  in  Plato  and  Aristotle.  In  the  Laws 
and  in  the  Republic  Plato  insists  upon  the  gulf  that 
should  separate  the  citizen  from  the  mechanic  or  trader. 
His  ideal  state  rests  upon  agriculture  and  all  the  citizens 
are  landed  gentry  forbidden  to  engage  in  trade.  In 
this  ideal  polls  trade  and  commerce  are  to  be  insignifi¬ 
cant  and  the  productive  class  is  actually  debarred  from 
all  political  rights.  A  caste  system  is  presupposed. 
Governors  and  governed  are  sharply  differentiated  and 
each  class  is  trained  for  its  predestined  position  in  the 
state.  Aristotle,  too,  in  his  ideal  state,  divides  the 
population,  on  the  one  hand,  into  a  ruling  class  of 
soldiers  and  judges  and,  on  the  other,  into  a  subject 
class  consisting  of  artisans  and  producers.  As  a 
mechanical  trade  renders  the  body  and  soul  and  intel¬ 
lect  of  free  persons  unfit  for  the  exercise  and  practice 
of  virtue,  Aristotle  denies  to  the  artisan  the  proper  ex¬ 
cellence  of  man  on  the  ground  that  his  occupation  and 
status  are  unnatural.  In  an  extreme  Democracy  the 
mechanic  and  hired  laborer  must  needs  be  citizens ;  this 
is  impossible  in  an  Aristocracy  in  which  virtue  and 
desert  constitute  the  sole  claim  to  the  honors  of  state. 
Other  radical  statements  of  Aristotle  are  that  the 
producer  only  differs  from  a  slave  in  being  subject  to 
all  instead  of  to  one  man,  and  that  the  sedentary  and 
within-door  nature  of  the  crafts  unfits  the  man  who 
exercises  them  for  war  and  the  chase,  the  most  dignified 
employments.  Physical  labor  is  condemned  by  him 
in  that  it  is  cheapening  to  work  for  another  for  pay  or 
material  profit,  as  this  reduces  one  to  the  rank  of  a 
slave  ( Politics  5.  1337  b.  8).  That  Aristotle  did  not 
represent  Athenian  opinion  is  conclusively  shown  by 
his  condemnation  of  agriculture  as  preventing  leisure 


92 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


which  is  at  the  basis  of  virtue.  But  no  one  doubts  that 
agriculture  was  generally  and  highly  esteemed  by  the 
Athenians.  In  Xenophon,  in  a  passage  which  is  repre¬ 
sented  as  spoken  by  Socrates,  those  base  mechanic  arts 
are  condemned  which  ruin  the  bodies  of  all  those  en¬ 
gaged  in  them,  as  those,  for  example,  who  are  forced 
to  remain  in  sitting  postures  and  hug  the  gloom  or 
crouch  whole  days  confronting  a  furnace.  This  results 
in  physical  enervation  and  enfeebling  of  the  soul,  and 
the  victims  have  no  desire  to  devote  to  the  claims  of 
friendship  and  the  state.  Such  will  be  sorry  friends 
and  ill-defenders  of  the  fatherland. 

One  makes  a  grievous  mistake  who  accepts  the  pas¬ 
sages  summarized  above  as  conclusively  proving  that 
the  Athenians  regarded  work  as  degrading  and  workers 
as  social  outcasts.  These  writers  do  not  claim  to  be 
describing  actual  Athenian  conditions.  They  have  in 
mind  an  “  ideal  ”  society  of  a  Spartan  complexion. 
They  are  thinking,  too,  of  soul-destroying  drudgery,  not 
of  reasonable  labor  and  skilled  work;  of  corrupt  and 
petty  business,  not  of  necessary  and  honest  trade  and 
affairs.  Frequently  they  were  contrasting  the  philoso¬ 
pher-statesmen  set  apart  for  ruling  with  the  defective 
yokel.  We  can,  indeed,  if  we  wish,  invoke  the  above- 
quoted  writers  in  defense  of  work  and  the  dignity  of 
producing.  Plato  says  in  the  Laws  (xi,  918)  “  Retail 
trade  in  a  city  is  not  intended  by  nature  to  do  any  harm, 
but  quite  the  contrary;  for  is  not  he  a  benefactor  who 
reduces  the  inequalities  and  incommensurabilities  of 
goods  to  equality  and  common  measure?  And  this  is 
what  the  power  of  money  accomplishes,  and  the  mer¬ 
chant  may  be  said  to  be  appointed  for  this  purpose.’9 
Plato  goes  on  to  observe  that  many  occupations  have 
suffered  ill-repute  because  of  the  inordinate  love  of 
gain  and  consequent  corrupt  practices  on  the  part  of 
the  unscrupulous.  He  concludes:  “  If  ...  we  were 
to  compel  the  best  men  everywhere  to  keep  taverns  for 
a  time,  or  carry  on  retail  trade,  or  do  anything  of  that 
sort:  or  if,  in  consequence  of  some  fate  or  necessity, 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  93 


the  best  women  were  compelled  to  follow  similar  call¬ 
ings,  then  we  should  know  how  agreeable  and  pleasant 
all  these  things  are;  and  if  all  such  occupations  were 
managed  on  incorrupt  principles,  they  would  be 
honored  as  we  honor  a  mother  or  nurse.”  Aristotle 
in  the  Politics  condemns  agriculture,  as  we  have  seen, 
yet  elsewhere  ( Rhetoric ,  2.  1381  a)  he  declares:  “  We 
honor  the  generous  and  brave  and  just.  Such  we  con¬ 
ceive  to  be  those  who  do  not  live  upon  others;  and 
such  are  they  who  live  by  labor  .  .  .  chiefly  agricul¬ 
turists,  and  chief  among  the  agriculturists,  the  small 
farmers.”  Now  these  small  farmers  tilled  their  own 
fields;  in  the  remote  districts  of  Attica  slavery  had 
scarcely  penetrated.  Xenophon  tells  the  story  of 
Eutherus,  an  old  friend  of  Socrates,  who,  in  poverty, 
as  his  property  had  been  lost  in  the  war,  was  gaining 
a  livelihood  by  bodily  toil.  Socrates  warns  him  that 
such  employment  in  his  case  can  be  only  temporary 
because  of  lack  of  necessary  physical  strength  and 
urges  him  to  secure  a  position  as  assistant  to  a  large 
proprietor  as  manager  of  an  estate.  Eutherus  fears 
that  the  work  may  be  servile.  Socrates  replies  that 
heads  of  departments  in  a  state  who  manage  property 
are  regarded  not  as  performing  undignified  work  but 
as  having  attained  a  higher  dignity  of  freedom. 
Eutherus  still  demurs  on  the  ground  that  he  does  not 
like  to  be  accountable  to  anyone.  Socrates  replies 
that  it  is  difficult  to  find  work  that  is  devoid  of  liability 
to  account.  It  is  difficult  to  avoid  mistakes  or  uh- 
friendly  criticism.  “  Avoid  captious  critics,”  he  says, 
“  attach  yourself  to  the  considerate.  Whatever  you 
can  do,  do  it  heart  and  soul  and  make  it  your  finest 
work.”  Another  interesting  and  significant  opinion  of 
Socrates  on  this  subject  is  reported  by  Xenophon.  It 
was  expressed  in  a  conversation  between  the  philosopher 
and  Aristarchus.  The  time  was  during  the  regime  of 
the  Thirty  when  economic  and  political  conditions  were 
very  bad.  Aristarchus’  house  was  full  of  his  indigent 
female  relatives,  fourteen  in  all.  As  these  ladies  were  all 


94 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


expert  needlewomen,  skilled  in  the  making  of  garments, 
Socrates  advises  his  friend  to  put  them  to  work; 
Ceramon,  for  example,  with  a  few  slaves,  is  very  pros¬ 
perous.  Aristarchus  objects  to  this  proposal;  the  situa¬ 
tions  are  not  comparable;  the  members  of  his  large 
household  are  not  barbarian  slaves  but  are  kinswomen 
and  free-born.  Socrates  replies:  “  Then,  on  the 
ground  that  they  are  free-born  and  relatives  you  think 
they  ought  to  do  nothing  but  eat  and  sleep?  Or  is 
it  your  opinion  that  free-born  people  who  live  in  this 
way  lead  happier  lives  and  are  more  to  be  congratulated 
than  those  who  devote  themselves  to  such  useful  arts 
of  life  as  they  are  skilled  in?  Are  work  and  study  of 
no  value?  Did  your  relatives  learn  what  they  know 
merely  for  useless  information  or  as  a  future  asset? 
Is  the  well-tempered  life  and  a  juster  one  attained 
rather  through  idleness  or  the  practice  of  the  useful? 
If  they  were  called  upon  to  do  some  shameful  work, 
let  them  choose  death  rather  than  that;  but  it  is  other¬ 
wise.  It  is  suitable  work  for  women.  The  things  which 
we  know  are  those  we  can  best  perform;  it  is  a  joy 
to  do  them,  and  the  result  is  fair.” 

Plenty  of  evidence  is  available  to  show  that  work 
was  esteemed  not  only  in  the  times  portrayed  by 
Homer  in  the  Iliad  and  the  Odyssey  and  Hesiod  in  his 
Works  and  Days ,  but  in  Athens  of  the  fifth  century 
b.c.  In  Athens  there  was  actually  a  law  directed 
against  idleness.  That  it  was  long  in  force  is  shown  by 
the  fact  that  Lysias  wrote  a  speech  in  connection  with 
a  prosecution  in  such  a  case  for  which  the  penalty  on 
conviction  was  a  fine  of  one  hundred  drachmas  and  dis¬ 
franchisement  if  the  accused  were  thrice  convicted. 
Plutarch  tells  us  that  a  son  who  had  not  been  taught 
a  trade  by  his  father  was  thereby  released  from  the 
obligation  to  support  his  parent  in  old  age.  We  have 
already  quoted  Pericles  to  the  effect  that  not  poverty 
but  indolence  is  degrading. 

Now  the  old-fashioned  assumption  that  the  Athen¬ 
ians  found  abundant  leisure  and  opportunity  for  the 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  95 


real  life  (i.e.,  art,  literature,  politics,  and  philosophy) 
only  because  slaves  and  women  did  everything  for  them 
and  the  state  treasury  liberally  supported  them  in  dolce 
far  niente  is  ridiculous.  One  thing  is  certain  from  all 
we  know  of  the  Athenians:  they  were  not  indolent; 
they  were  energetic  in  mind  and  body.  Certainly 
in  any  State  the  wealthy  are  but  a  minority  of 
the  total  population  and  even  upon  these  rests  the 
duty  to  manage  their  property  and  care  for  in¬ 
vestments.  Participation  in  public  life  and  fulfilment 
of  the  demands  and  duties  of  good  citizenship  did  not 
exact  from  the  average  Athenian  anything  like  the 
major  part  of  his  waking  hours.  The  Assembly  met 
four  times  in  each  prytany  (or  tenth  of  a  year  period), 
i.e.,  about  once  in  eight  days.  The  attendance  was 
voluntary  and  only  a  fraction  of  all  who  were  entitled 
to  attend  were  ever  present,  as  convenience  or  interest 
dictated.  The  Council  was  limited  to  five  hundred 
citizens  and  no  one  might  serve  more  than  twice; 
furthermore,  fifty  only  of  the  Council  (the  Presidents, 
the  Standing  Committee)  were  continuously  on  duty, 
so  that  the  majority  thus  were  free  to  attend  to  their 
private  affairs.  The  Heliaea ,  or  Courts  of  Justice,  drew 
their  dicasts  (jurors)  for  service  from  a  list  of  six  thou¬ 
sand  citizens.  These  jurors  were  usually  men  of  ad¬ 
vanced  years  who  had  volunteered  for  such  service. 
Universal  military  service  at  this  time  was  not  obliga¬ 
tory.  Festivals  and  contests  were  generally  attended, 
but  they  occurred  probably  not  oftener  than  once  a 
week  on  the  average.  It  has  been  estimated  that  a 
total  of  from  two  to  three  years  of  every  citizen’s  life 
were  required  for  deliberative  and  administrative 
duties.  Many  writers  have  emphasized  the  huge  num¬ 
ber  of  citizens  who  were  supposedly  pensioners  luxuri¬ 
ously  supported,  apparently  permanently  and  com¬ 
pletely,  by  largess  from  the  Periclean  treasury.  But 
we  have  seen  that  public  duties  were  not  constant.  As 
for  the  compensation,  it  must  be  remembered  that  the 
daily  living  wage  for  the  workman  was  from  one  drach- 


96 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


ma  (about  eighteen  cents)  to  one  and  a  half  drachmas. 
Now,  at  the  time  under  consideration,  Assemblymen 
received  no  compensation;  jurymen  received  two  obols 
(about  six  cents)  daily  for  service;  members  of  the 
Council  of  Five  Hundred,  elected  annually  by  lot,  were 
paid  five  obols  (about  fifteen  cents).  In  the  light  of 
these  facts,  how  can  it  be  claimed  that  “  Pericles 
corrupted  the  citizens  generally  by  gifts  of  money, 
making  them  idle,  cowardly,  and  greedy,”  or  to  assume 
that  these  citizens  were  all  dependent  on  public  pay 
and  could  entirely  support  their  households  on  these 
meager  stipends?  Only  a  minority  of  the  some  fifty 
thousand  adult  male  citizens  received  any  State  pay. 
The  remuneration  given  was  not  a  living  wage;  it  was 
merely  a  contribution  to  support  by  which  Pericles  pro¬ 
vided  that  all ,  and  not  merely  the  well-to-do,  might 
participate,  in  turn,  in  civic  affairs  and  obtain  that 
benefit  and  culture  from  active  personal  public  service 
to  which  he  eloquently  refers  in  the  Funeral  Oration . 
Nor  was  the  remuneration  intended  as  a  sop  to  placate 
the  discontented  and  starving  proletariat.  As  Pro¬ 
fessor  Ferguson  says:  “  Pericles  did  not  intend  to 
create  a  class  of  salaried  officials;  nor  yet  to  make  an 
advance  toward  communism.  His  ideal  was  political, 
not  economic,  equality  to  enable  all,  irrespective  of 
wealth  or  station,  to  use  the  opportunities  and  face  the 
obligations  which  democracy  brought  in  its  train.  Like 
all  the  great  democratic  leaders  who  preceded  him,  he 
was  a  nobleman  by  birth  and  breeding,  and,  like  them, 
he  did  not  doubt  for  a  moment  that  the  culture  that 
ennobled  the  life  of  his  class  would  dignify  and  uplift 
that  of  the  masses  also.  His  aim  was  to  unite  the  whole 
people  in  a  community  of  high  ideas  and  emotions.  It 
was  to  make  them  a  nation  of  noblemen.”  If  this  were 
not  the  case,  Pericles’  noble  speech,  which  stands  in 
history  by  the  side  of  Lincoln’s  Gettysburg  address,  is 
the  most  hypocritical  document  preserved  to  us  from 
the  past. 

Since  the  number  of  wealthy  citizens  was  small,  how 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  97 


did  the  ordinary  citizen  gain  his  livelihood?  It  was  by 
means  of  agriculture,  handicrafts,  trades,  wholesale 
and  retail  business,  and  daily  labor.  No  occupa¬ 
tion  was  more  respected  and  admired  than  agriculture. 
Farms  were  small,  tenancy  almost  unknown.  The 
small  farmer  tilled  his  fields  with  his  own  hands.  In 
the  arts  and  crafts  and  in  labor  no  one  needed  to  be 
idle,  for  the  state  policies  of  Pericles  and  the  great 
building  operations  not  only  gave  employment  to  all 
the  residents  of  Athens,  whether  free  men  or  slaves,  but 
attracted  workers  from  far  and  near.  Thousands  of  citi¬ 
zens,  perhaps  a  third  of  the  whole,  gained  a  livelihood 
by  labor.  While  commerce  was  largely  in  the  hands  of 
the  resident  aliens,  and  the  heaviest  drudgery  was  per¬ 
formed  by  slaves,  the  mass  of  the  skilled  workers  were 
free  citizens.  Stone-cutters,  masons,  and  sculptors  had 
their  shops  or  yards  where  they  worked  privately  with 
their  apprentices,  or  they  might  be  engaged  in  public 
work,  such  as  the  building  operations  on  the  Acropolis, 
working  side  by  side  with  other  citizens,  with  metics, 
and  with  slaves.1 

Modest  means  was  the  rule  in  Athens  and  was  no  bar 
to  achievement  and  distinction.  Life  and  its  needs 
were  simple,  and  money  in  itself  as  an  accumulation 
was  not  desired.  A  uniform  wage  was  paid  practically 
to  all  skilled  workmen  alike.  Everyone  who  had  skill 
or  art  was  an  artist,  a  term  applied  to  sculptors, 
painters,  physicians,  and  cobblers.  Plato,  to  be  sure, 
who  was  wealthy,  speaks  harshly  of  those  sophists  and 
teachers  who  were  compelled  to  take  money  for  teach¬ 
ing.  There  were,  indeed,  some  charlatans  in  this  pro¬ 
fession,  but  we  may  be  certain  that  such  sophists  as 
Gorgias,  Protagoras,  Isocrates,  and  Alcidamas  (all  of 
whom  were  professors  who  accepted  tuition-fees  from 
countless  students  who  were  only  too  glad  to  pay  it)  were 
held  in  esteem  in  Athens.  So  were  lawyers  and  speech- 
writers  for  pay,  such  as  Antiphon,  Lysias,  and  Isaeus. 
Literary  men  who  accepted  pay,  poets  who  received 

1  See  Chapter  IV  for  Plutarch’s  description  of  these  activities. 


98 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


purses  for  prizes,  and  actors  who  profited  financially 
by  their  labors  were  in  good  social  repute.  The  prestige 
of  physicians  depended  on  their  skill  and  personality. 
The  ignoramus  and  the  charlatan  were  contemned; 
the  skilled  and  public-spirited  surgeon  might  be  richly 
rewarded  and  given  an  honorary  crown  and  public 
thanks.  The  elementary-school  teacher,  the  music  and 
gymnastic  instructor,  were  not  highly  regarded,  not 
because  they  received  money  for  their  services,  but 
because  most  of  them  were  ignorant  men  and  often 
of  inferior  breeding.  As  for  the  great  artists,  sculptors, 
and  painters,  it  is  impossible  to  believe,  as  we  have 
been  told,  that  they  fell  under  public  contempt  simply 
because  they  earned  money.  Could  this  be  true  of  a 
Phidias,  a  Polygnotus,  an  Ictinus,  or  a  Mnesicles?  But 
we  know  that  Phidias  was  a  warm  and  extremely  inti¬ 
mate  personal  friend  of  Pericles.  In  fact,  the  states¬ 
man  admired  the  sculptor  so  highly  that  the  latter  was 
entrusted  with  the  greatest  powers  in  superintending 
the  ornamentation  of  the  great  temples.  As  for  Polyg¬ 
notus,  a  native  of  Thasos,  he  was  the  personal  friend 
of  Cimon,  and  was  actually  honored  by  the  Athenians 
with  citizenship.  Expert  potters  and  vase-painters 
were  very  numerous.  While  some  of  these  were  resi¬ 
dent  aliens  (e.g.,  Amasis  and  Brygus),  very  many  were 
citizens.  Thus  we  find  such  names  of  prominent  vase- 
makers  as  Clitias,  Ergotimus,  Nicosthenes,  Epictetes, 
Pamphaeus,  Euphronius,  Hieron,  and  Megacles.  A 
typical  vase-making  establishment  would  engage  the 
services  of  some  twelve  persons,  who  might  be  citizens, 
metics,  and  slaves,  all  working  side  by  side  in  equality. 
Citizen  artists  and  artisans  proclaim  with  pride,  and 
do  not  conceal  in  shame,  their  occupations.  Vase- 
painters  and  makers  signed  their  wares.  A  scene  (The 
Workshop  of  a  Greek  Vase-Painter)  on  a  vase  shows 
two  Victories  and  Athena  herself  crowning  the  work¬ 
men,  as  Pottier  says,  “  a  poetic  symbol  to  glorify  the 
fame  of  Athenian  industry.”  Indeed,  artisans  regarded 
themselves  as  under  the  special  protection  of  Hephaes- 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  99 


tus,  the  smith,  and  of  Athena,  mistress  of  the  arts  and 
crafts,  and  proudly  claimed  descent  from  these  deities. 
Euphronius,  when  making  an  offering  to  Athena,  calls 
himself  in  his  dedication  a  potter,  and  the  same  pro¬ 
cedure  is  followed  by  the  fuller  Simon,  the  tanner 
Smicrus,  and  the  potters  Mnesiades  and  Nearchus.  On 
a  funereal  bas-relief  a  cobbler  was  represented  in  a 
heroic  attitude  holding  the  insignia  of  his  trade.  In 
the  neighborhood  of  the  Agora  shops  were  especially 
numerous.  These  places  served  as  centers  of  gossip 
and  of  news  for  Athenians  generally,  as  we  are  told  in 
a  graphic  passage  in  an  informative  speech  of  Lysias 
{On  the  Cripple ):  “  My  accuser  says  that  many  un¬ 

principled  men  gather  at  my  shop.  But  you  (the  large 
jury)  all  know  that  this  accusation  is  not  directed  at  me 
more  than  at  other  artisans,  nor  at  those  who  frequent 
my  place  more  than  those  who  go  to  other  shops.  Each 
of  you  is  accustomed  to  visit  the  establishment  of  the 
perfumer,  or  the  barber,  or  the  leatherworker,  etc.  If 
any  of  you  shall  condemn  my  visitors,  then  he  must 
condemn  the  frequenters  of  other  places;  and  if  these, 
then  all  the  Athenians .  Certainly  all  of  you  are  ac¬ 
customed  to  frequent  these  shops  and  spend  time  some¬ 
where  or  other.”  It  was  among  these  craftsmen  that 
Socrates,  who  had  himself  started  in  life  as  a  stone¬ 
cutter,  spent  much  time  in  conversation.  When  he  was, 
on  an  occasion,  in  search  of  a  gentleman,  he  did  not 
hesitate  to  go  the  round  of  various  good  carpenters, 
bronzeworkers,  painters,  and  sculptors. 

The  comedies  of  Aristophanes  are  sometimes  taken 
as  proof  of  great  social  distinctions  and  inequalities 
existing  among  the  citizens  of  Athens;  e.g.,  the  pas¬ 
sage  in  the  Knights  where  the  sausage-seller  is  assured 
that  his  crass  ignorance,  boorish  vulgarity,  and  dense 
stupidity  are  the  strongest  possible  recommendations 
and  assets  for  the  highest  political  distinction.  We  are 
apparently  to  infer  that  Aristophanes  was  himself  a 
deep-dyed  aristocrat  who  despised  the  people  and  their 
rule  and  that  he  was  the  spokesman  for  a  large  aristo- 


100 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


cratic  section  of  Athenian  society  which  was  extremely 
hostile  to  democratic  government.  These  views  are 
unwarranted  and,  indeed,  have  been  discredited.  Aris¬ 
tophanes  was  not  a  partisan;  he  was  a  conservative. 
He  was  not  an  opponent  of  democracy,  nor  yet  an  aris¬ 
tocrat.  It  is  true  that  he  was  a  well-educated  man  of 
keen  discernment,  a  friend  of  the  Knights,  and  was 
doubtless  on  good  terms  with  members  of  the  aristo¬ 
cratic  element  in  Athens.  But  he  was  friendly  to  the 
cause  of  democracy  and  sincerely  wished  to  do  it  a 
favor  by  fearlessly  revealing  those  defects  to  which  a 
democratic  form  of  government  is  especially  liable  and 
to  give  warning  of  possible  dangers.  This  he  constantly 
does  in  his  plays  with  that  exaggeration  and  caricature 
which  are  characteristic  of  the  Old  Comedy.  In  the 
opinion  of  the  poet  grave  danger  to  the  democracy 
might  arise  from  unscrupulous  demagogy  as  repre¬ 
sented  by  such  knaves  as  Cleon.  In  the  case  of  Cleon, 
who  is  lampooned  in  the  Knights ,  Aristophanes  is  actu¬ 
ated  by  intense  animus  as  a  result  of  previous  personal 
encounters.  Thus  Cleon  is  excoriated  as  a  vulgar, 
coarse, and  despicable  individual,  and  the  dramatist  tries 
to  discredit  his  influence  and  popularity.  It  is  a  great 
mistake,  however,  to  take  Aristophanes’  savage  attacks 
on  vulgar  demagogues  and  his  criticisms  of  weaknesses 
in  democratic  government  as  proof  that  the  playwright 
was  an  aristocrat  who  condemned  and  arraigned  the 
people  as  a  whole  for  vulgarity  and  incompetency. 
That  he  did  not  despair  of  the  democracy  and  that  he 
sympathized  and  fraternized  with  the  “  lower  classes  ” 
is  shown  by  those  plays  in  which  the  chief  personages, 
although  of  low  degree,  are  “  sympathetic  ”  characters, 
e.g.,  Dicaeopolis,  the  charcoal-burner  of  the  Acharn - 
tans ,  and  Strepsiades,  the  rough  countryman  of  the 
Clouds. 

In  the  opinion  of  Croiset,  “  the  best  Athenian  society 
was  the  most  open-hearted,  most  variously  constituted, 
and  most  liberal  society  that  has  ever  existed.  The 
Athens  that  Plato  shows  us  is  a  sort  of  talking  place, 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  101 


where  everybody  is  supposed  to  know  everybody  else, 
and  where  each  person  has  a  perfect  right  to  make  ac¬ 
quaintance  with  those  he  meets.”  As  typical  illustra¬ 
tions  of  this  social  democracy  he  refers  to  two  social 
gatherings  of  which  we  have  admirable  accounts.  In 
Xenophon’s  Symposium  there  is  a  description  of  a 
banquet  held  in  421  b.c.,  in  the  house  of  the  wealthy 
Callias,  son  of  Hipponicus,  of  a  great  and  rich  Athenian 
family.  The  guests  include  all  sorts  of  people,  rich, 
poor,  philosophers  and  ignoramuses,  and  all  converse 
familiarly  on  terms  of  equality  and  intimacy.  In  the 
same  way,  Plato,  in  his  Symposium ,  an  account  of  a 
dinner  held  at  the  house  of  Agathon  in  416  b.c.,  reveals 
the  same  intermixture  of  classes  and  professions. 

We  have  now  completed  our  discussion  of  the  essen¬ 
tially  democratic  political  and  social  status  of  Athenian 
citizens.  We  shall  next  consider  the  other  classes  of  the 
inhabitants  of  Attica  who  are  commonly  regarded, 
along  with  the  poorer  citizens,  as  the  victims  of  the 
Athenian  aristocracy. 

II.  The  Metics 

The  rapid  commercial  growth  and  naval  expansion 
of  Athens  early  caused  a  shortage  of  workers  and 
helpers  of  all  kinds.  The  citizen  population  was 
numerically  inadequate  to  assume  these  new  duties  in 
addition  to  the  performance  of  their  regular  occupa¬ 
tions  and  the  prosecution  of  agriculture.  This  demand 
was  met  by  extending  a  welcome  to  foreigners  and  this 
policy  was  continued  and  encouraged  by  Pericles. 
Their  exact  number  in  the  year  431  b.c.  is  unknown 
and  various  estimates  have  been  made.  There  may 
have  been  one  adult  male  metic  for  every  two  citizens. 

What  was  the  lot  of  the  metics?  Pericles  says:  “We 
open  our  city  to  all  and  never  drive  out  foreigners.” 
The  scene  of  Plato’s  dialogue,  The  Republic,  is  the 
house  of  Cephalus,  a  prominent  and  influential  man, 
but  a  metic  who  had  been  invited  to  Attica  by  Pericles 


102 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


himself.  Another  contemporary  speaks  of  “  the  equal¬ 
ity  between  the  metics  and  the  full  citizens,  because 
the  city  stands  in  need  of  her  resident  aliens  to  meet 
the  requirements  of  such  a  multiplicity  of  arts  and  for 
the  purposes  of  her  navy.”  Thucydides  has  Nicias 
say  to  metic  sailors  that  they  and  not  any  friends  or 
allies  outside  were  the  “  only  free  partners  with  the 
Athenians  in  the  Empire.”  The  metics  participated 
fully  in  the  social  and  religious  life  of  the  city.  Neither 
in  dress  nor  in  appearance  could  they  be  distinguished 
from  the  citizens.  They  attended  the  theater,  they  had 
a  prominent  place  and  dress  in  the  Panathenaic  proces¬ 
sion,  and  worshipped  the  same  deities  as  the  citizens. 
With  the  citizens  they  defrayed  the  expenses  of  the 
liturgies  and  served  in  the  navy.  When  any  list  of 
Athenian  inhabitants  is  given  the  metics  are  always 
named  as  an  essential  element  of  the  population.  They 
worked  in  large  numbers  side  by  side  for  equal  pay  with 
the  citizens  in  all  kinds  of  work,  as,  for  example,  in 
the  construction  of  the  Erechtheum.  They  are  found 
engaged  in  all  the  occupations  as  workers  and  artisans 
in  manufacture  and  in  the  shipping,  fishing,  and  im¬ 
porting  industries.  At  Athens  not  only  were  they 
retailers  and  petty  tradesmen  but  they  occupied  the 
highest  places  and  gained  the  greatest  repute  in  large 
business  affairs  as  well  as  in  the  realms  of  art  and  intel¬ 
lect,  the  “  higher  professions  ”  as  we  should  designate 
them.  To  give  some  examples  of  these  prominent  metics 
will  be  illuminating.  Sosias  of  Thrace  was  the  employer 
of  a  thousand  slaves  at  Laurium.  Pasion,  who  pos¬ 
sessed  a  fortune  of  sixty  talents,  and  Phormion  were 
the  greatest  bankers  of  the  fourth  century  b.c.  In  the 
arts  Nesiotes  (probably  an  Ionian),  Agoracritus,  and 
Cresilas  were  great  sculptors;  Polygnotus  of  Thasos, 
Zeuxis  of  Heraclea,  Parrhasius  of  Ephesus  were  paint¬ 
ers  of  renown;  Hippodamus  of  Miletus,  the  architect, 
was  the  designer  of  the  city  Piraeus.  Hippocrates  of 
Cos,  the  physician,  enjoyed  great  popularity.  Many  of 
the  greatest  philosophers,  sophists,  and  teachers  were 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  103 


metics.  Such  were  Anaxagoras  of  Clazomenae,  Protag¬ 
oras  of  Abdera,  Gorgias  of  Sicily,  Prodicus  of  Ceos, 
Hippias  of  Elis,  Polus  the  Sicilian,  Aristotle  the  Stag- 
irite  (of  Thrace),  Theophrastus  of  Eresus,  Antisthenes 
(a  half-Athenian),  and  Zeno. 

The  annual  fee  of  twelve  drachmas  (about  $2.16) 
required  of  metics  was  a  legal  formality  of  registra¬ 
tion  and  license  and  not  a  very  serious  tax  burden. 
The  liability  to  taxes  beyond  those  required  of  citizens 
was  not  great.  Perhaps  the  most  serious  limitation 
imposed  upon  metics  was  the  inability  legally  to  own 
real  property.  But  metics  might  be  placed  on  equal 
terms  as  to  taxation  and  the  owning  of  property  and 
even  full  citizenship  might  be  conferred  by  vote  of  the 
Assembly.  For  example,  an  inscription  is  preserved 
which  records  the  grant  of  full  citizenship  on  those 
metics  who  participated  in  the  return  of  the  democrats 
from  Phyle  (in  404-3  b.c.)  and  helped  in  the  restora¬ 
tion.  In  the  list  occur  some  strangely  sounding  foreign 
names  and  the  occupations  of  these  persons,  as  given, 
are  decidedly  humble,  such  as  cook,  gardener,  carpen¬ 
ter,  fuller,  etc. 

The  Athenians  have  been  harshly  criticized  for 
not  freely  and  generally  granting  citizenship  to  the 
metics.  At  first  thought  the  criticism  may  seem  valid 
and  Athens  may  appear  illiberal.  Doubtless  selfish 
considerations,  such  as  an  unwillingness  to  share  with 
others  the  material  benefits  of  citizenship,  played  a 
part  in  this  policy.  But  to  the  Athenian,  citizenship 
was  not  merely  a  political  privilege ;  it  was  a  sacred  and 
usually  an  inherited  possession.  Loss  of  citizenship 
was  to  be  feared  more  than  death  itself.  Athens  was 
a  small  and  homogeneous  community  and  the  Athenians 
regarded  themselves  as  autochthonous,  like  their  favor¬ 
ite  and  symbolic  cicada,  sprung  from  the  very  soil  of 
Attica  itself.  There  is  danger  to  a  state  in  a  too  rapid 
influx  of  aliens  who  are  given  the  powers  of  citizenship 
before  real  political  and  social  assimilation  has  taken 
place.  Even  free  America  requires  a  term  of  years  of 


104 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


probation  before  naturalization,  and  one  of  our  greatest 
problems  surely  is  this  very  one  of  the  assimilation  of 
the  large  number  of  our  resident  aliens.  As  Aristotle 
says:  “Another  cause  for  revolution  is  difference  of 
races  which  do  not  acquire  a  common  spirit;  for  the 
state  is  not  the  growth  of  a  day,  neither  is  it  a  mul¬ 
titude  brought  together  by  accident.  Hence  the  recep¬ 
tion  of  strangers  in  colonies  has  generally  produced 
revolution.”  It  is  true  that  the  metics  of  Athens  were 
not  on  full  terms  of  political  equality  with  the  citizens, 
but  it  has  been  shown  that  the  social  and  economic  gulf 
postulated  by  modern  writers  as  existing  between 
citizen  and  resident  foreigner  did  not  really  exist. 

III.  The  Slaves 

The  institution  of  slavery  existed  throughout  the 
ancient  world  from  the  earliest  times.  The  Athenians, 
with  but  few  exceptions,  regarded  slavery  as  natural 
and  justifiable.  It  is  again  Aristotle,  the  fourth-century 
theorist  and  philosopher,  who  is  made  the  starting-point 
for  most  modern  discussions  of  slavery  among  the 
Greeks  and  of  the  iniquity  of  the  institution  as  main¬ 
tained  even  by  the  cultured  Athenians  of  the  time  of 
Pericles.  In  his  treatment  of  this  subject  Aristotle 
characterizes  in  cold-blooded  legal  fashion  the  slave 
as  being  merely  “  a  breathing  machine  or  tool,  a  piece 
of  animated  property,”  and  asserts  that  some  men  are 
so  inferior  that  they  may  be  regarded  as  slaves  by 
nature.  It  is  interesting  to  note,  however,  that  Aristo¬ 
tle  in  another  passage  admits  that  there  were  some 
who  protested  against  such  a  view.  He  says:  “  Others 
regard  slave  owning  as  doing  violence  to  nature  on  the 
ground  that  the  distinction  between  slave  and  free  man 
is  wholly  conventional  and  has  no  place  in  nature,  and 
therefore  is  void  of  justice,  as  resting  on  mere  force.” 
Plato  ( Republic  5.469),  too,  regards  slavery  as  natural 
and  justifiable,  but  would  forbid  the  enslavement  of 
Greeks  ( Laws  777b) ;  he  admits  ( Republic  563b),  how- 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  105 


ever,  that  “  a  slave  is  an  embarrassing  possession,  the 
distinction  between  man  and  slave  being  a  difficult  one 
and  slaves  should  be  well-treated  and  not  abused  or 
insulted.”  Aristotle  {Politics  1255b),  also,  advises 
good  treatment  for  the  slave. 

Whence  came  the  slaves  owned  by  the  Athenians? 
Who  were  they?  A  few  were  born  in  servitude  of  slave 
parents,  but  the  majority  were  captives  of  war.  Bar¬ 
barian  captives  were  generally  sold  into  slavery  and 
sometimes  even  prisoners  of  Greek  blood  suffered  the 
same  fate.  Most  of  the  slaves  in  Athens  were  from 
Thrace  and  Scythia  and  Illyria,  from  Asia  Minor  and 
from  Syria.  At  Athens  there  was  a  flourishing  slave 
market.  The  price  varied  according  to  age,  sex,  origin 
and  abilities.  At  a  household  auction  at  Athens  in  415 
b.c.  male  slaves  sold  at  an  average  price  of  166  drach¬ 
mas  (=  francs);  women,  170.  Mine-slaves  sold  for 
somewhat  less.  An  Athenian  family  of  moderate  means 
might  have  perhaps  three  slaves;  a  richer  household 
would  own  more. 

Some  writers  have  been  very  severe  in  their  stric¬ 
tures  on  the  Athenians  for  tolerating  slavery.  When 
we  consider  that  slavery,  which  has  not  even  yet  dis¬ 
appeared  from  the  earth,  is  of  great  antiquity  and 
that  it  was  an  integral  part  of  all  ancient  social  institu¬ 
tions,  it  is  not  surprising  that  Athens  was  not  free  of 
this  blemish.  As  it  has  been  well  said,  we  should  not 
ask,  How  could  Athens  tolerate  slavery?  but,  How  did 
the  Athenians  treat  her  slaves?  And  the  answer  is, 
“  with  humanity  and  on  the  whole,  with  kindness  and 
liberality.”  It  is  true  that  a  minority  of  slaves  in  Attica 
must  have  had  an  unenviable  existence.  These  were 
the  men  of  the  lowest  type  who  worked  in  the  silver 
mines  at  Laurium.  Elsewhere  occasionally,  no  doubt, 
an  individual  slave  suffered  at  the  hands  of  a  cruel 
master.  But  what  was  the  lot  of  the  majority  of  the 
slaves  in  Attica?  A  contemporary  testifies:  “  An  ex¬ 
traordinary  amount  of  license  is  granted  to  slaves  .  .  . 
where  a  blow  is  illegal,  and  a  slave  will  not  step  aside 


106 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


to  let  you  pass  him  on  the  street.  .  .  .  The  Athenian 
people  is  not  better  clothed  than  the  slave  or  the  alien, 
nor  in  personal  appearance  is  there  any  superiority. 

.  .  .  Slaves  in  Athens  are  allowed  to  indulge  in  luxury, 
and  indeed  in  some  cases  to  live  magnificently.  .  .  . 
We  have  established  an  equality  between  our  slaves 
and  free  men.”  Newly  acquired  slaves  were  received 
into  the  household  with  showers  of  confetti.  They 
participated  as  members  of  the  family  in  religious  rites 
and  sacrifices.  They  might  attend  the  theater.  They 
worked  side  by  side  with  their  masters  in  the  workshop 
or  might  even  be  permitted  to  work  on  their  own  ac¬ 
count  exercising  an  independent  profession  either  pay¬ 
ing  a  commission  to  their  masters  or  actually  purchas¬ 
ing  their  freedom  and  gaining  thereby  the  status  of 
metics.  The  law  protected  a  slave  from  being  the 
victim  of  insolent  violence  and  the  aggressor  was  sub¬ 
ject  to  fine.  The  slave  might  not  be  put  to  death;  a 
free  man  who  had  killed  a  slave  was  subject  to  prosecu¬ 
tion  for  manslaughter.  Refuge  from  a  cruel  master 
was  afforded  by  flight  to  a  temple  as  sanctuary,  espe¬ 
cially  to  the  Theseum,  to  the  Sanctuary  of  the  Erinyes, 
and  to  the  altar  of  Athena  Polias.  Freedom  might  be 
granted  outright  by  the  master,  while  the  state  at  times 
enfranchised  slaves  who  had  fought  for  Athens.  In 
case  of  illness  a  slave  might  be  affectionately  cared  for 
and  at  death  mourned  as  a  relative. 

On  the  whole,  then,  Athenian  slaves  were  treated 
with  consideration.  They  were  not  sweated  and 
worked  under  the  lash  of  a  slave-driver,  but  were  given 
a  place  in  the  household  or  participated  in  friendly 
relations  in  the  work  of  shop  and  factory.  The  work 
they  did,  with  the  exception  of  mining,  had  variety  and 
was  of  a  nature  to  arouse  their  interest  and  demand 
skill  and  it  was  performed  under  agreeable  and  healthy 
conditions.  Can  this  be  said  of  the  toilers  today  in  the 
sweat-shops  and  factories  of  our  congested  industrial 
centers? 

Finally,  the  almost  universal  assumption  that  Athen- 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  107 

ian  achievements  were  possible  only  through  slavery, 
and  that  slavery  was  the  dominant  factor  in  Athenian 
economic  life,  is  a  gross  exaggeration.  On  the  con¬ 
trary,  the  slaves  were  in  the  minority  in  the  total  popu¬ 
lation  in  the  latter  half  of  the  fifth  century  b.c.  and  the 
prosperity  and  greatness  of  the  city-state  was  due  not 
to  the  exploitation  of  slave  labor,  but  to  the  industry, 
the  initiative,  and  the  efficiency  of  citizen  and  metic, 
in  whose  hands  the  political,  the  intellectual,  the 
artistic,  and  the  commercial  fortunes  rested.  In  the 
flourishing  period  of  Athenian  greatness  the  slaves  were 
not  a  source  of  political  discontent  as  at  Rome.  We 
hear  of  no  serious  servile  uprisings  or  servile  wars  at 
Athens.  They  were  not  a  social  and  economical 
menace,  nor  was  there  competition  in  labor  between 
slave  and  free  man,  for  there  was  no  unemployment 
in  Athens  in  the  age  of  Pericles,  but  there  was  a  demand 
for  labor,  immigration  was  encouraged,  and  there  was 
a  living  wage  for  all.  Nor  was  it  the  case  at  this  time 
that  all  hand-labor  became  associated  with  slavery  and 
hence  became  incompatible  with  the  dignity  of  the  free 
man.  It  is  undoubtedly  true,  however,  that  in  the 
fourth  century  and  later  the  competition  of  slave  with 
free  labor  gave  rise  to  economic  distress  at  a  time  when 
the  citizens  had  decreased  in  number  and  the  slaves  had 
enormously  increased. 

IV.  The  Women  of  Athens 

When  we  survey  the  position  of  women  in  Athenian 
life  we  are  disappointed  to  discover  how  small  and  un¬ 
important  a  role  they  seem  to  have  played.  In  an  era 
of  greatness  and  freedom,  at  a  time  and  in  a  community 
when  the  flower  of  mighty  achievement  and  the  attain¬ 
ment  of  individual  liberty  came  to  magnificent  bloom, 
the  influence  of  women  was  largely  negligible  in  the 
larger  life  of  the  city-state.  Plato  in  his  Republic  would 
grant  women  complete  intellectual  and  spiritual  de¬ 
velopment  and  equality,  but  this  ideal  was  not  realized 


108 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


in  Athens.  This  condition  of  affairs  would  strike  us 
as  deplorable  and  would  be  well-nigh  inexplicable  were 
it  not  for  the  fact  that  in  modern  times  the  emancipa¬ 
tion  of  women  has  been  of  slow  attainment  and  even  to¬ 
day  awaits  full  realization.  Athenian  women  did  not 
enjoy  the  political  privileges  of  the  vote  and  of  partici¬ 
pation  in  affairs  of  government;  nor  did  American 
women  until  very  recently.  Athenian  girls  did  not  re¬ 
ceive  the  systematic  schooling  and  higher  education 
which  their  brothers  might  enjoy;  higher  education  for 
American  girls  dates  from  the  last  few  decades  and  even 
now  some  doors,  as  those  of  certain  professional  schools, 
are  closed  to  them.  Athenian  young  women  of  good 
family  did  not,  and  could  not,  leave  the  protection  of 
their  male  relatives  and  embark  upon  any  independent 
life  or  career:  this,  too,  is  a  phenomenon  of  very  recent 
appearance  in  a  modern  society  which  accounted  it¬ 
self  respectable.  There  was  no  economic  pressure  to 
bring  about  economic  independence.  Modern  emanci¬ 
pation  of  woman  has  largely  come  about  through  excess 
of  women  over  men,  late  marriage,  spinsterhood,  and 
the  influence  of  the  World  War  which  drew  women  into 
active  life. 

The  marriage  of  an  Athenian  girl  was  a  matter  which 
was  arranged  by  her  parents  and  a  dowry  must  be 
provided,  as  is  the  case  today  in  many  lands.  The 
mental  education  of  an  Athenian  girl  was  limited  to 
elementary  instruction  obtained  from  mother  or  nurse 
in  the  home.  Regular  schooling  was  denied  her.  She 
might  at  best  acquire  a  knowledge  of  reading,  writing, 
and  dancing  and  music.  Emphasis  was  placed  on 
the  acquisition  of  domestic  arts,  weaving,  cooking,  and 
household  management.  She  did  not  enjoy  the  privi¬ 
lege  of  participation  in  athletics,  a  prerogative  of 
Spartan  girls.  From  the  protecting  care  of  her  parents 
she  passed  at  an  early  age  to  the  home  of  her  husband 
to  put  in  practice  the  domestic  accomplishments  pre¬ 
viously  acquired.  There  her  life  was  largely  passed 
and  having  had  little  education  and  not  enjoying  the 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  109 


intellectual  advantages  which  Athens  so  richly  fur¬ 
nished  to  men,  she  gave  little  pleasure  to  her  husband 
as  an  intellectual  companion.  Nor  did  he  seek  to  im¬ 
prove  her  mind  and  give  her  opportunities,  since  nearly 
all  his  time  was  spent  away  from  home,  at  his  work  or 
pleasure  or  devoted  to  public  service.  And  when  he 
brought  home  friends  or  guests  it  was  not  customary 
for  his  wife  or  daughters  to  appear. 

There  are  two  passages  which  are  always  quoted 
to  show  the  position  of  women  in  Athens.  The  first  one 
is  found  in  Xenophon’s  Economist  (vii.  5,  translated 
by  Dakyns) ,  where  Ischomachus  relates  to  Socrates  the 
training  and  virtues  of  his  young  wife,  not  quite  fifteen 
when  she  was  wedded.  The  second  quotation,  from  the 
speech  of  Pericles,  will  be  given  later.  Ischomachus 
says:  “  Socrates,  when  after  a  time  she  had  become 
accustomed  to  my  hand,  that  is,  was  tamed  sufficiently 
to  play  her  part  in  a  discussion,  I  put  to  her  this  ques¬ 
tion:  ‘  Did  it  ever  strike  you  to  consider,  dear  wife, 
what  led  me  to  choose  you  as  my  wife  among  all 
women,  and  your  parents  to  entrust  you  to  me  of  all 
men?  ...  It  was  with  deliberate  intent  to  discover, 
I  for  myself  and  your  parents  in  behalf  of  you,  the  best 
partner  of  house  and  children  we  could  find.  If  at 
some  future  time  God  grant  us  to  have  children  born 
to  us,  we  will  take  counsel  together  how  best  to  bring 
them  up,  for  that  too  will  be  a  common  interest,  and  a 
common  blessing  if  haply  they  shall  live  to  fight  our 
battles  and  we  find  in  them  hereafter  support  and 
succour  when  ourselves  are  old.  But  at  present  there  is 
our  house  here,  which  belongs  alike  to  both.  It  is  com¬ 
mon  property,  for  all  that  I  possess  goes  by  my  will  into 
the  common  fund,  and  in  the  same  way  all  that  you 
deposited  was  placed  by  you  to  the  common  fund.  We 
need  not  stop  to  ca’culate  in  figures  which  of  us  con¬ 
tributed  most,  but  rather  ht  us  lay  to  heart  this  fact 
that  whichever  of  us  proves  the  better  partner,  he  or 
she  at  once  contributes  what  is  most  worth  having.’  ” 
3?he  gist  of  Ischomachus’  homily  to  his  young  wife  is 


110 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


that  by  divine  dispensation  woman’s  nature  was  shaped 
for  indoor  and  man’s  for  outdoor  occupations;  man  and 
woman  alike  need  and  must  use  memory,  carefulness 
and  self-control.  But  the  wife,  like  the  queen-bee  of 
the  hive,  will  order  the  home,  apportion  and  assign  the 
work,  spinning,  weaving,  preparation  of  food  and  the 
nursing  of  the  sick,  and  teach  the  young  servants  their 
tasks.  The  young  couple  then  proceed  carefully  to  ar¬ 
range  furniture  and  all  belongings  where  they  may  be 
found  and  used  when  needed.  The  young  wife,  we  are 
told,  was  a  willing  pupil  and  obediently  agreed  to  the 
carrying  out  of  these  suggestions  to  the  best  of  her 
ability  and  even  assented  to  her  husband’s  suggestion 
that  she  discontinue  the  use  of  rouge,  face-powder  and 
high-heeled  shoes  on  the  ground  that  “  beauty  un¬ 
adorned  is  adorned  the  most!  ” 

The  sentiment  of  romantic  love  in  a  highly  developed 
and  idealistic  form  is  of  modern  origin.  Here,  Greek 
realism  largely  reigned.  To  the  Greek,  marriage  was 
primarily  natural  and  indeed  inevitable  since  only  thus 
was  the  family  perpetuated.  It  was  in  itself  a  political 
and  economic  institution:  political,  as  only  the  offspring 
of  Athenian  parents  on  both  sides  were  citizens;  eco¬ 
nomic,  as  the  husband  was  provided  with  a  home  and 
housekeeper  and  the  wife  with  a  protector  and  a  liveli¬ 
hood.  The  sons  would  be  defenders  of  the  state  and  a 
support  and  solace  to  their  parents  in  their  advancing 
years.  Athenian  literature  is  almost  silent  with  regard 
to  women.  It  is  true  that  Homer  has  noble  feminine 
types,  Penelope,  Andromache,  Arete  and  Nausicaa,  and 
that  tragedy  abounds  with  such  women  as  sublimely 
courageous  Antigone,  intrepid  Electra,  self-sacrificing 
Alcestis,  loving  Deianira  and  many  others,  but  these 
are  women  of  heroic  times  and  heroic  mold. 

It  must  not  be  thought,  however,  that,  because  the 
Greek  marital  union  was  a  manage  de  convenance, 
tenderness  and  affection  were  lacking  in  Athenian 
marriages.  Scattered  references  in  the  literature,  the 
inscriptions  and  the  evidence  of  the  graves  and  the 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  111 


grave  monuments  attest  the  presence  of  natural  human 
ties  of  love  and  devotion.  The  high  ideals  of  woman¬ 
hood  found  in  the  poets  were  doubtless  inspired  by 
women  of  Athens.  Monogamy  prevailed  as  a  legal 
institution,  showing  the  regard  for  the  integrity  of  the 
family  and  the  tribe,  and  respect  for  woman.  The 
seclusion  of  the  Athenian  women  was  not  the  Oriental 
seclusion  of  the  harem.  Women  participated  in  public 
festivals  and  religious  rites,  in  the  celebration  of  the 
Panathenaea  with  the  sacred  procession  to  the  Acrop¬ 
olis,  and  they  could  attend  the  theater.  The  fact  re¬ 
mains,  however,  that  the  native  Athenian  woman  of  the 
well-to-do  classes  was  carefully  protected  and  largely 
secluded  according  to  the  old  tribal  feeling.  Pericles 
doubtless  gave  utterance  to  the  common  sentiment  with 
regard  to  women  of  the  most  highly  respected  class 
when  he  said:  “  Great  is  your  glory  if  you  fall  not  be¬ 
low  the  standard  which  nature  has  set  for  your  sex,  and 
great  also  is  hers  concerning  whom  there  is  least  talk 
among  men  whether  in  praise  or  blame.’7  These  Athen¬ 
ian  conventions  did  not  bind  the  foreign-born  women  in 
Athens,  who  enjoyed  freedom  of  action  and  opportuni¬ 
ties  for  mutual  improvement  together  with  associa¬ 
tion  with  men.  These  women,  called  hetairae  (com¬ 
panions),  are  represented  at  their  best  by  the  beautiful, 
clever,  and  high-born  Aspasia,  the  mistress  of  Pericles. 
The  women  of  the  poorer  classes,  too,  naturally  had 
more  freedom  of  action  and  probably  engaged  in  out¬ 
door  work  and  in  trade  to  a  certain  extent. 

Although  Athenian  women  generally  led  happy  and 
contented  lives,  their  segregation  was  unfortunate  in 
its  consequences.  It  was  unjust  to  the  women  them¬ 
selves  and  it  reacted  unfavorably  upon  the  young  men, 
who,  in  some  cases,  were  driven  to  the  society  of 
courtesans  or  formed  sentimental  attachments  with 
youths. 


112 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Conclusion 

In  summing  up  conditions  of  Athenian  life  in  the 
Age  of  Pericles  as  we  have  above  attempted  to  do,  the 
following  considerations,  which  are  unfortunately  often 
forgotten  or  ignored,  must  be  kept  in  mind.  The  place 
is  democratic  Athens  and  not  aristocratic  Sparta  or 
Thebes;  evidence  which  is  pertinent  for  the  latter  cities 
must  not  be  adduced  for  the  former.  The  time  is  the 
latter  part  of  the  fifth  century  and  not  the  sixth  or  late 
fourth  century  b.c.,  when,  to  be  sure,  social,  political, 
and  economic  conditions  were  very  different. 

The  ideas  and  theories  of  Plato  and  Aristotle  on  these 
questions  are  of  the  greatest  interest  and  value  —  but 
they  are  ideal  and  aristocratic  conceptions  relative  to 
hypothetical  communities  and  must  not,  and  cannot,  be 
taken  literally  to  reflect  actual  Athenian  conditions,  nor 
are  they  truly  representative  of  contemporary  popular 
belief. 

With  regard  to  work,  it  is  true  that  in  Athens,  as 
with  us,  some  occupations  were  thought  less  desirable 
and  less  dignified  than  others.  In  no  land  and  at  no 
time  is  the  day-laborer  esteemed  as  highly  as  the 
statesman.  Drudgery  and  menial  employment  the 
Athenians  disliked  and  avoided;  so  do  we.  But  the 
citizen  who  earned  his  living  in  some  honest  way  and 
accepted  money  for  his  services  was  the  rule  and  not 
the  exception,  nor  was  he  as  a  result  a  social  outcast, 
but  he  was  a  member,  in  good  political  and  social  stand¬ 
ing,  of  the  commonwealth.  We  may  compare,  perhaps, 
Athenian  social  conditions  with  those  existing  today  in 
an  American  village  where  socially  the  blacksmith  or 
the  grocer  may  be  on  a  par  with  the  doctor  or  lawyer. 

While  the  metics,  or  resident  aliens,  did  not  have  full 
participation  in  political  duties  and  privileges,  nor  yet 
complete  legal  freedom,  they  did  share  in  large  measure 
the  life  of  the  citizens.  The  door  of  opportunity  and 
of  material  and  social  well-being  lay  open  to  them. 

Athenian  civilization  of  the  Age  of  Pericles  was  not 


POLITICAL  AND  ECONOMIC  CONDITIONS  113 


dominated  by  the  institution  of  slavery.  But  slavery 
was,  of  course,  a  constant  and  very  important  factor 
and  influence  in  Athenian  life.  The  right  of  owning 
slaves  was  hardly  questioned.  It  is  clear  that  as  a 
rule  slaves  were  treated  by  their  masters  with  humane¬ 
ness,  with  the  exception  perhaps  of  the  lowest  grade 
of  public  slaves  who  were  employed  in  the  mines. 

The  position  of  women  in  Athens  was  not  what  it 
was  even  in  Homeric  times,  and,  from  the  point  of  view 
of  the  most  advanced  modern  society  of  the  last  few 
years,  their  lives  were  unfortunately  restricted.  The 
wives  and  the  daughters  of  Athenian  citizens  were  re¬ 
spected,  protected,  and  no  doubt  genuinely  loved  in 
most  cases,  and  were  generally  happy  and  contented, 
but  the  fact  remains  that  they  had  only  a  minor  share 
in  the  intellectual  freedom  and  opportunities  of  that 
great  period. 

Athens,  then,  was  a  city-state  with  many  imperfec¬ 
tions.  Her  escutcheon  is  by  no  means  free  from  blots, 
and  some  of  these  are  deplorable.  She  was  vexed  by 
innumerable  problems  which  she  could  not  solve  com¬ 
pletely  and  many  of  these  still  await  solution  in  our 
world  today  which  is  torn  by  dissensions  and  evils. 
But  in  her  civilization,  her  achievements,  and  strivings 
for  a  genuine  democracy  and  a  better  social  order  she 
has  much  of  value  to  contribute  to  us. 


CHAPTER  IX 

GREEK  WRITING  AND  BOOKS 

“  The  ancient  classical  writings  furnish  perpetual  delight  as 
models  of  style;  they  touch  imagination,  stimulate  thought,  and 
enlarge  our  view  of  man  and  nature.  They  enter  into  and  have 
done  much  to  instill  what  is  best  in  modern  literature  and  are  the 
common  heritage  of  civilized  peoples,  the  permanent  foundation 
on  which  the  republic  of  letters  has  been  built.”  —  Lord  Bryce. 

FOR  the  purpose  of  writing  many  materials  served 
primitive  society.  The  leaves  of  trees,  as  the 
palm,  were  used;  the  bark  of  trees,  or  the  inner 
rind  (hence  liber ,  in  Latin,  came  to  mean  book) ;  and 
linen  cloth  was  employed  by  the  ancient  Egyptians, 
and  occasionally  by  the  Romans,  for  books  in  ritual. 
The  favorite  medium  of  the  Babylonians  and  the 
Assyrians  was  pottery  or  clay,  such  as  sun-dried  or 
fire-burnt  bricks.  In  early  Greece  we  hear  of  inscribed 
potsherds,  or  ostraka  (hence  the  word  ostracism,  since 
the  name  of  the  person  condemned  to  exile  was  written 
on  vase  fragments).  Charms,  prayers,  and  especially 
curses  were  frequently  inscribed  on  lead  tablets.  Stone 
was  extensively  used  by  the  Greeks  for  inscriptions  of 
all  kinds  such  as  laws,  epitaphs,  and  dedications. 

In  the  classical  period  in  Greece  the  common  medium 
for  writing  was  the  waxed  tablet,  which  was  employed 
for  letters,  memoranda,  accounts,  etc.  This  tablet  was 
a  smooth  wooden  surface  about  seven  by  four  inches 
covered  with  black  wax  and  with  a  raised  frame  at  the 
edges.  Thus  two  tablets  (a  diptych)  or  three  (a 
triptych)  could  be  fastened  together,  the  surfaces  pro¬ 
tected  and  held  apart.  For  writing  on  the  waxed  sur¬ 
face  an  instrument,  sharp  at  one  end  and  with  the 
other  blunt  for  erasing,  made  of  bronze,  bone,  or  ivory 
was  used. 

H4 


GREEK  WRITING  AND  BOOKS 


115 


Three  materials  for  permanent  written  records  have 
been  in  general  use,  namely,  papyrus,  vellum  (skin), 
and  paper.  Of  these,  papyrus  was  the  common  medium 
for  the  writing  of  books  among  the  Greeks.  Vellum 
was  employed  largely  in  the  second  century  b.c.  and 
thereafter.  Paper  was  not  used  by  the  Greeks. 

Papyrus  was  used  in  Egypt  from  great  antiquity  and 
was  an  article  of  manufacture  and  commerce  until 
the  tenth  century  a.d.  As  it  was  customary  to  bury 
the  dead  as  mummies  wrapped  in  layers  of  papyrus, 
and  since  the  dry  soil  and  climate  of  Egypt  are  wonder¬ 
ful  preservatives,  we  have  obtained,  and  are  still  find¬ 
ing,  many  papyrus  documents  of  greater  or  lesser  value 
and  interest  in  Egyptian  excavations. 

Papyrus  ( papyros  or  biblos,  hence  the  Greek  word 
for  book,  biblos,  English  bible )  was  made  from  the 
reedy  plant  grown  in  the  delta  region  of  the  Nile  in 
Egypt.  Strips  from  the  pith  of  the  stem  of  the  reed 
were  taken  and  wetted,  placed  some  vertically  and 
others  transversely,  rolled  and  flattened,  smoothed  into 
sheets  and  then  glued  together  to  form  a  roll. 

These  rolls,  in  the  fifth  and  fourth  centuries,  were 
of  great  length,  as  much  as  150  feet  so  as  to  contain, 
for  example,  the  whole  Iliad  or  Odyssey .  But  such 
manuscripts  were  very  unwieldy  and  the  protest  of 
Callimachus,  head  of  the  Alexandrian  library  in  the 
third  century  b.c..,  is  famous,  for  he  said  that  a  “  big 
book  (i.e.,  a  long  roll)  was  a  big  evil.”  After  his  time 
we  find  that  for  convenience  classical  works  were 
marked  off  into  divisions,  each  portion  of  such  length  so 
as  to  fill  a  standard  roll  ( biblion ),  which  was  some 
twenty  to  thirty  feet  in  length  and  nine  to  ten  inches  in 
width.  Thus,  in  the  Alexandrian  period,  the  Iliad  was 
divided  into  twenty-four  books  or  rolls  designated  by 
the  capital  letters  of  the  Greek  alphabet;  the  Odyssey 
likewise  into  twenty-four  books  indicated  by  the  small 
letters  of  the  alphabet;  Herodotus  into  nine  books,  each 
named  for  a  Muse;  Thucydides  into  eight  books; 
Plato’s  Republic  into  ten  books,  etc.  A  single  roll 


116 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


( volumen )  would  suffice  for  a  short  work  or  poem.  The 
roll  was  rolled  on  a  stick  and  kept  in  a  cylindrical  box 
for  preservation.  A  vellum  strip  with  title  or  index  was 
attached  to  the  roll  for  identification.  This  might 
easily  be  tom  off  or  lost  and  thus  the  authorship  of  the 
work  be  uncertain  as  the  document  itself  might  not 
indicate  the  writer’s  name  or  the  exact  title  of  the 
work.  For  writing  on  the  papyrus  a  sharp  reed 
(< calamus )  was  at  first  used,  the  quill  of  a  feather  much 
later.  Black  ink,  made  of  lamp-black  in  the  classical 
period,  was  employed,  which  might  be  erased,  when  still 
fresh,  with  a  sponge.  Writing  was  on  one  side  only  of 
the  papyrus  and  in  columns  the  lines  of  which  ran 
parallel  with  the  length  of  the  roll.  The  lines  of  the 
columns  were  the  average  length  of  the  hexameter 
verse,  that  is,  16  syllables  or  34  to  38  letters.  A  roll 
containing  poetry  comprised  700  to  1100  verses,  iambic 
and  dactylic  verses  being  written  line  by  line,  lyric  and 
dramatic  meters  sometimes  as  verse  and  sometimes 
as  prose.  The  prose  book-roll  contained  2000  to  3000 
lines.  These  lines,  on  one  side  of  the  papyrus  only, 
were  written  as  continuous  script,  generally  without 
separation  of  words,  without  punctuation  or  para¬ 
graphs,  and  with  no  numbering  of  columns  or  lines. 
Exact  references  to  writers,  therefore,  were  difficult 
to  make  or  to  find  and  this,  together  with  the  scarcity 
of  copies  of  books,  led  to  much  quoting  from  memory 
by  classical  authors.  Signs  of  punctuation  were  few  and 
rarely  used.  Lateral  strokes  might  show  a  pause  or 
change  of  speaker  or  indicate  strophe  or  antistrophe. 
The  early  script  was  in  Greek  capital  letters,  as  in  in¬ 
scriptions.  For  ease  and  rapidity  of  writing  the  capitals 
came  to  be  written  as  curved  capitals,  i.e.,  uncials.  A 
further  stage  was  the  use  of  small  letters  somewhat 
run  together,  i.e.,  cursive  script.  The  marks  of  accent 
and  breathing  were  invented  by  the  Alexandrian 
scholar  Aristophanes  of  Byzantium,  in  the  third  cen¬ 
tury  b.c.,  for  the  purpose  of  teaching  Greek  pronuncia¬ 
tion  to  foreigners.  Such  marks  are  not  found  in  gen- 


GREEK  WRITING  AND  BOOKS 


117 


eral  and  constant  use  before  the  seventh  century  a.d. 
Comma  and  interrogation  point  appear  in  the  ninth 
century. 

Skins  were  early  employed  for  writing  purposes,  but 
were  not  commonly  used  because  of  the  expense  of 
manufacture.  There  is  an  Egyptian  skin-roll  in  the 
British  Museum  dating  from  about  2000  b.c.  Perga- 
mum  was  the  ancient  center  of  the  trade  in  vellum. 
In  fact,  the  word  parchment  comes  from  the  proper 
name  Pergamum.  The  story  is  told  by  Pliny  that  the 
Ptolemies  forbade  the  exportation  of  papyrus  to  pre¬ 
vent  Eumenes  II  (b.c.  197-158)  from  founding  at 
Pergamum  a  library  which  might  rival  that  at  Alex¬ 
andria  and  that  the  manufacture  and  use  of  vellum 
were  thereby  greatly  stimulated.  The  advantages  of 
vellum  are  great  as  the  material  is  extremely  durable 
and  permits  the  codex ,  or  book  form  (a  development 
of  the  early  tablets),  and  also  makes  possible  erasure 
and  re-writing  and  the  use  of  color  and  dyeing.  As- 
skin  allows  writing  on  both  sides,  a  large  work  may 
be  accommodated  in  small  space;  references,  too,  are 
easy.  The  codex,  or  folded  book,  however,  was  not 
common  before  the  fourth  century  a.d. 

Paper  was  not  used  by  the  Greeks,  although  it  was 
known  to  the  Chinese  from  early  times.  Europe  be¬ 
came  acquainted  with  its  use  in  the  eighth  century 
a.d.  through  the  Arabs,  but  it  was  not  employed  to 
any  great  extent  before  the  thirteenth  century.  In  the 
fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries,  with  the  invention 
of  printing,  paper  superseded  the  use  of  vellum. 

There  was  no  reading  public  in  Greece  before  the 
fifth  century  b.c.  The  early  literature  was  exclusively 
poetical  and  intended  for  recitation  and  singing.  For 
centuries  the  Homeric  poetry  was  declaimed  or  recited 
by  rhapsodes;  lyric  poetry  was,  of  course,  sung  to  the 
accompaniment  of  the  lyre;  elegy  was  originally  recited 
to  the  accompaniment  of  the  flute.  Written  records 
of  this  great  body  of  verse  were  not  numerous  and 
memory  was  the  vehicle  of  its  transmission.  Lovers 


118 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


of  literature  enjoyed  this  poetry  through  the  medium 
of  the  ear  and  not  through  the  eye.  In  the  fifth  century, 
Attic  tragedy  became  very  popular  and  this,  together 
with  more  wide-spread  education  of  the  people  gener¬ 
ally,  led  to  the  making  of  books,  the  establishment  of 
a  book-market  in  the  market-place  at  Athens  and,  in 
some  cases,  the  accumulation  of  private  libraries. 
Aristophanes  refers  to  Euripides’  large  library  and 
Socrates  mentions  the  published  works  of  Anaxagoras 
and  also  says  that  his  friend  Euthydemus  has  a  com¬ 
plete  copy  of  Homer.  Xenophon  relates  that  a  part 
of  a  cargo  of  a  wrecked  ship  consisted  of  books.  It 
is  evident  that  there  was  a  considerable  business  in 
books  in  Athens  at  the  close  of  the  fifth  century  b.c. 
Publication  of  a  work  was,  of  course,  entirely  a  private 
matter.  The  author  had  no  protection  or  copyright; 
he  made,  or  caused  to  be  made,  a  number  of  copies  of 
his  work  and  these  were  sold  by  a  bookseller.  There¬ 
after,  any  one  could  copy  and  dispose  of  the  book. 
We  do  not  know  much  with  regard  to  the  details  of 
Athenian  book-making,  selling,  and  copying.  No  doubt 
dictation  by  a  reader  to  a  number  of  copyists  facilita¬ 
ted  manufacture.  Constant  copying  early  and  inevit¬ 
ably  caused  many  errors  and  corruptions  in  texts  and 
this  was  particularly  true  of  the  plays  where  interpola¬ 
tions,  changes  and  additions  by  actors  and  trainers 
crept  into  the  text.  Because  of  this  growing  evil  official 
texts  of  Homer  and  the  tragedians  were  compiled  to 
insure  their  integrity. 

The  first  large  public  library  seems  to  have  been 
that  of  Alexandria.1  The  city  of  Alexandria  was 
founded  in  332  b.c.  by  Alexander  the  Great.  In  the 
next  century  Ptolemy  Soter  with  the  Peripatetic  philos¬ 
opher-statesman  Demetrius  of  Phalerum  founded  the 
famous  Library  and  Museum  (temple  of  the  Muses) 
and  these  educational  and  scientific  institutions  were 
fostered  by  Ptolemy  Philadelphus.  It  is  said  that  the 

1  On  the  history  of  scholarship  at  Alexandria  and  the  great  library, 
consult  the  Introduction  to  J.  W.  White’s  The  Scholia  on  the  Aves  of 
Aristophanes;  also,  G.  Murray,  The  Tradition  of  Greek  Literature. 


GREEK  WRITING  AND  BOOKS 


119 


great  Library  eventually  contained  700,000  volumes. 
In  charge  of  this  great  collection  were  librarians  whose 
names  are  famous  in  classical  scholarship,  and  in 
Homeric  criticism  particularly,  e.g.,  Aristophanes  of 
Byzantium,  Aristarchus,  Eratosthenes,  and  Callima¬ 
chus.  These  men  catalogued  and  published  editions  of 
the  books  in  the  Library  and  compiled  commentaries 
upon  the  classical  writers.  Lists  or  “  Canons  ”  of  the 
best  of  the  authors  of  the  past  were  established,  as, 
for  example,  the  Canon  of  the  Ten  Attic  Orators,  the 
Nine  Lyric  Poets,  and  others.  Texts  were  purged  of 
errors  and  much  was  done  to  interpret  and  to  elucidate 
the  literature  of  an  earlier  age.  Another  great  library 
of  200,000  volumes  was  established  in  the  first  century 
b.c,  at  Pergamum.  At  Antioch,  Cos,  and  Rhodes  were 
other  collections  of  manuscripts. 

An  interesting  but  melancholy  subject  is  that  of  the 
losses  which  Greek  literature  has  sustained.  The  ex¬ 
tent  of  the  writings  of  the  great  Greek  authors  which 
we  possess  is  fortunately  very  considerable  and  suffici¬ 
ently  ample  to  give  us  a  splendid  conception  of  the 
beauty,  merit,  and  genius  of  the  literature  and  an  ex¬ 
cellent  knowledge  of  Greek  civilization.  But  we  know 
that  the  losses  have  been  enormous.  For  example, 
there  were  numerous  epic  poems  besides  those  of 
Homer.  Literary  losses  before  the  Alexandrian  Age 
were  great,  but  they  were  tremendous  thereafter.  The 
Alexandrians  had  a  great  body  of  lyric  poetry  —  many 
books  of  the  poetry  of  Aleman,  Alcaeus,  Sappho, 
Stesichorus,  and  Simonides  —  whereas  we  have  scanty 
fragments  only  of  these  poets.  They  had  seventeen 
books  of  Pindar  which  Plutarch  (80  a.d.)  read;  we 
have  four.  It  has  been  estimated  that  over  nine  hun¬ 
dred  tragedies  were  produced  in  Athens  by  the  prolific 
and  original  dramatists;  only  thirty- three  remain  to 
us  today.  Of  Aeschylus  the  Alexandrians  had  seventy- 
two  plays;  we  have  seven.  Sophocles  wrote  over  a 
hundred  plays;  seven  are  extant.  Euripides  wrote 
more  than  ninety  tragedies  and  of  these  the  Alex- 


120 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


andrians  had  seventy-eight;  we  have  nineteen.  As  late 
as  200  a.d.  plays  of  Euripides,  now  lost,  were  extant. 

How  can  this  great  shrinkage  be  explained?  There 
are  many  reasons  that  may  be  assigned.  First  and 
foremost,  doubtless,  is  that  gradual  loss  of  interest  in 
the  fine  literary  masterpieces  which  inevitably  accom¬ 
panied  the  decline  in  general  and  higher  education,  and 
the  worship  of  the  purely  practical.  Learning  de¬ 
creased.  The  Greek  language,  i.e.,  the  pure  Attic  and 
literary  dialect,  suffered  corruptions  and  inevitable 
change  in  foreign  lands  since  Athens  was  no  longer  “  the 
eye  of  Greece.”  As  the  centuries  passed  the  classical 
authors  could  no  longer  be  easily  understood  and  came 
to  be  neglected  because  of  their  difficulty.  So  the 
student  of  English  today  needs  help  in  reading  even 
Shakespeare.  The  student  in  the  modern  University 
of  Athens  translates  his  ancient  writers  into  modern 
Greek.  In  Greek  poetry,  accent  gradually  took  the 
place  of  quantity  as  the  basis  for  verse.  The  short¬ 
cut  to  knowledge  was  preferred ;  hence  there  sprang  up 
a  veritable  crop  of  Anthologies,  Scrap-books,  and 
Collections  of  all  kinds  with  explanatory  notes  and 
commentaries.  For  example,  since  the  Epinician  Odes 
of  Pindar  were  the  most  popular  of  his  works,  some 
unknown  person  in  the  second  century  a.d.  published 
with  notes  this  part  only,  and  the  other  books  were 
lost.  Certain  plays  of  the  trio  of  Attic  tragedians,  seven 
of  Aeschylus  and  seven  of  Sophocles,  were  chosen  and 
annotated  for  the  use  of  schools  and  intelligent  readers. 
Many  copies  were  probably  made  of  these  plays  and  the 
others  were  lost. 

It  is  probable,  however,  that  the  chief  losses  of  Greek 
literature  occurred  at  the  time  when  vellum  was  substi¬ 
tuted  for  papyrus  as  a  medium  of  writing.  Vellum  was 
much  the  more  expensive  material  and  consequently 
only  works  of  great  interest  or  importance  or  popular¬ 
ity  were  chosen  to  be  transmitted  to  the  rarer  material. 
As  papyrus  is  very  perishable  when  neglected,  the 
earlier  manuscript  decayed.  Long  works  were  often 


GREEK  WRITING  AND  BOOKS 


121 


copied  only  in  part,  hence  many  writings  were  subjected 
to  mutilation.  Libraries,  as  the  Alexandrian,  suffered 
from  theft  or  fire.  Finally,  the  coming  of  the  Turk, 
which  put  an  end  to  the  Byzantine  Empire,  brought 
about  the  destruction  of  the  surviving  Greek  literature, 
with  the  exception  of  those  literary  remains  which  were 
carried  to  Italy  by  Greek  refugees.  Many  agencies, 
we  see,  operated  to  reduce  the  extensive  mass  of  the 
original  Greek  literature. 

Is  there  hope  of  recovering  any  of  these  lost  writ¬ 
ings?  There  is  little  chance  of  finding  in  the  libraries 
of  Europe  many  more  vellum  manuscripts,  but  the 
sands  of  Egypt  annually  yield  Greek  papyri.  In 
Egyptian  excavations  many  important  works  have  been 
found,  such  as  the  Constitution  of  Athens  of  Aristotle, 
the  Odes  of  Bacchylides,  the  Mimes  of  Herondas, 
several  speeches  of  the  Athenian  orator  Hyperides,  a 
few  poems  of  Sappho  and  Pindar,  a  large  part  of  a 
Sophoclean  satyr  play,  and  large  portions  of  several 
comedies  of  Menander. 


CHAPTER  X 

GREEK  LITERATURE 

“  Greek  poetry  springs  out  of  life,  remains  always  in  touch 
with  life,  sees  life  steadily  and  sees  it  whole,  and  therefore 
presents  to  the  imaginative  reason  the  broadest,  sanest,  truest 
poetic  criticism  of  life.  .  .  . 

“  We  cannot  recover  the  habitual  temper  of  mind  that  created 
Greek  poetry.  But  we  can  make  of  it  an  incomparable  educa¬ 
tional  instrument  in  youth,  and  in  our  riper  years  a  possession 
of  beauty  that  will  keep,  amid  the  turmoil  and  distractions  of 
our  fevered  modern  life,  ‘  a  bower  quiet  for  us  and  a  sleep  full 
of  sweet  dreams  and  health  and  quiet  breathing.’  ”  —  Paul 
Shorey. 

WHY  should  persons  today,  other  than  scholars, 
be  concerned  with  Greek  literature?  Our 
own  English  literature  is  an  overflowing 
treasury  of  prose  and  verse.  Consider,  too,  the  ex¬ 
tensive  literature  in  French,  Italian,  Spanish,  German, 
and  the  other  modern  languages.  Must  we  take  time, 
then,  amid  our  many  modern  and  pressing  interests  and 
duties  to  read  Greek  literature  produced  hundreds,  nay, 
even  thousands  of  years  ago?  Shall  we  find  interest 
and  derive  profit  in  its  study  commensurate  with  our 
labors?  To  these  questions  an  emphatic  yes  is  the 
answer  given  by  all  discerning  and  competent  readers, 
who  appreciate  Greek  literature  not  merely  as  a  mirror 
which  reflects  the  life  and  thought  of  a  gifted  people, 
but  who  enjoy  it  as  a  thing  of  beauty  and  a  revelation 
of  truth.  Because,  too,  of  the  pervasive  and  all  im¬ 
portant  influence  which  Greek  literature  has  exerted  on 
all  subsequent  literature  no  student  can  afford  to  neg¬ 
lect  its  study.  The  literature  of  Greece,  as  all  literature 
of  intrinsic  excellence,  should  be  read  in  the  original. 
However,  for  those  who  do  not  enjoy  the  privilege  of 
a  first-hand  acquaintance  there  are  now  available 


122 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


123 


many  excellent  translations.  The  titles  of  these 
are  found  in  the  bibliographical  list  for  this  chapter. 

Ancient  Greek  literature  falls  into  five  great  periods 
or  ages:  I.  The  Age  of  Epic  Poetry  (from  the  begin¬ 
ning,  to  the  seventh  or  the  beginning  of  the  sixth  century 
b.c. ) .  II.  The  Age  of  Lyric  Poetry  (the  seventh,  sixth, 
and  part  of  the  fifth  centuries  b.c.).  III.  The  Attic 
Period  (about  475-300  b.c.).  IV.  The  Alexandrian 
Age  (from  about  300  b.c.  until  the  Roman  Conquest 
of  Greece  in  146  b.c.).  V.  The  Graeco-Roman  Age 
(146  b.c.  to  Justinian,  526  a.d.). 

I.  The  Epic  Age 

It  is  a  remarkable  phenomenon  in  Greek  literature 
that  its  earliest  manifestations,  the  Homeric  poetry,  is 
likewise  a  very  great,  if  not  its  greatest,  literary 
achievement.  This  is  not  the  time  or  the  place  for  a 
discussion  of  the  much  vexed  Homeric  question,  which 
has  produced  a  vast  literature  in  itself  on  the  problem 
of  the  origin,  date,  and  authorship  of  the  Homeric 
Poems.  The  Iliad  and  the  Odyssey,  the  two  great 
epics,  handed  down  in  the  Epic-Ionic  dialect  and  com¬ 
posed  in  dactylic  hexameters,  undoubtedly  are  the  cul¬ 
mination  of  a  long  period  of  literary  activity  which  was 
concerned  with  early  legends,  hymns,  and  folk-songs. 
In  particular  these  songs  dealt  with  heroes  and  cele¬ 
brated  their  glorious  deeds.  The  hero  of  the  Iliad  is 
brave,  “  swift-footed  ”  Achilles,  and  its  24  “  books,”  or 
divisions,  vividly  relate  the  fighting  of  Greeks  and  Tro¬ 
jans  at  Ilium,  the  wrath  of  the  hero,  and  its  conse¬ 
quences.  The  Odyssey,  also  divided  by  the  Alex¬ 
andrians  for  convenience  into  24  books,  narrates  the 
exciting  adventures  of  the  intrepid  and  resourceful 
Odysseus  on  his  long  and  much-delayed  journey  home 
to  Ithaca.  These  two  great  epic  poems  may  have 
originated  in  Asia  Minor,  between  Aeolis  and  Ionia. 
They  seem  to  have  come  from  the  same  poetic  school 
and  to  have  been  largely  perfected  in  the  ninth  or  by 


124 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


the  end  of  the  eighth  century  b.c.,  and  many  scholars 
today  maintain  that  they  were  composed  by  one  great 
mind,  the  traditional  poet  Homer,  whose  genius  re¬ 
created  the  subject-matter  of  tradition.  He  who  wishes 
to  enjoy  great  poetry,  however,  must  not  trouble  his 
peace  of  mind  and  waste  his  time  in  reading  books 
about  Homer.  Let  him  turn  to  the  immortal  poems 
themselves.  Their  stories  are  simple  and  the  thought 
is  plain,  but  the  observation  is  profound.  The  char¬ 
acters  are  vividly  portrayed.  The  style  is  noble  and 
dignified.  The  Homeric  Poems  are  the  greatest  of  the 
world’s  epic  poems.  Without  them  Greek  literature 
can  hardly  be  imagined;  through  them  the  world  has 
been  inestimably  enriched. 

Other  epics,  too,  now  lost,  the  Greeks  possessed,  e.g., 
the  Cyclic  Poems ,  the  epic  cycle  of  poems,  such  as  the 
Little  Iliad,  the  Cypria,  the  Sack  of  Ilium,  the  Nostoi, 
the  Oedipodeia,  etc. 

The  second  great  name  in  Greek  literature  is  that  of 
Hesiod,  of  Ascra  in  Boeotia,  the  author  of  two  im¬ 
portant  poems,  the  Works  and  Days  and  the  Theogony. 
Hesiod’s  poetry  is  didactic  and  gnomic  rather  than  epic, 
although  he  borrows  freely  from  Homer  in  his  use  of 
the  dactylic  hexameter,  and  in  his  diction  and  phrase¬ 
ology.  The  Works  and  Days  is  a  sort  of  Farmers’  Al¬ 
manac,  treating  of  agriculture  and  its  conduct  and 
specifying  lucky  and  unlucky  days  for  the  husband¬ 
man.  With  navigation,  too,  the  poem  deals.  The 
necessity  and  the  dignity  of  labor  and  thrift  are  con¬ 
stantly  preached,  together  with  exhortations  to  good 
behavior  and  justice.  The  Theogony  is  largely  con¬ 
cerned  with  the  creation  and  origin  of  the  universe  and 
the  descent  and  relationship  of  the  gods.  Another 
long  poem,  the  Shield  of  Heracles,  was  anciently, 
though  falsely,  attributed  to  Hesiod.  Although  the 
poems  of  Hesiod  reveal  at  times  passages  of  poetic  ex¬ 
cellence,  yet,  in  general,  the  Muses  of  Helicon  granted 
him  no  great  inspiration.  But  as  early  Greek  docu¬ 
ments,  treating  of  cosmogony  and  theogony,  these 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


125 


poems  are  of  great  interest  and  are  of  value  in  the 
study  of  Greek  religion,  while  the  Works  and  Days  to 
some  extent  influenced  the  Georgies  of  Vergil. 

The  Homeric  Hymns ,  thirty-four  in  number,  may 
conveniently  be  included  in  the  discussion  of  Epic 
poetry  although  they  are  much  later  than  this  period, 
as  they  date  from  the  end  of  the  eighth  to  the  beginning 
of  the  fifth  century  b.c.  They  are  Homeric  only  inso¬ 
far  as  they  are  written  in  the  dactylic  hexameter,  em¬ 
ploy  epic  narration,  and  borrow  freely  the  diction  and 
the  phraseology  of  the  Homeric  poems.  The  shorter 
Hymns,  as  we  have  them,  are  merely  preludes  to  longer 
compositions  sung  by  rhapsodes  at  festivals  in  praise 
of  the  gods.  Several  are  of  considerable  length  and 
great  excellence  and  charm,  for  example,  the  Hymn  to 
the  Delian  and  Pythian  Apollo  (546  lines)  and  the 
Hymns  to  Dionysus ,  Aphrodite ,  Demeter ,  and  Hermes. 
The  long  hymn  to  Demeter  is  of  moving  beauty.  It 
tells  the  familiar  tale  of  the  rape  of  Persephone  by 
Pluto,  of  the  sad  wanderings  of  the  bereaved  mother, 
Demeter,  in  search  of  her  lost  daughter,  of  Demeter’s 
stay  at  Eleusis  where  she  takes  the  disguise  of  an  aged 
nurse,  the  founding  of  the  sacred  Eleusinian  Mysteries, 
of  Persephone’s  restoration  to  her  mother  for  part  of 
the  year,  and  of  the  reconciliation  of  Demeter  with  the 
gods.  The  appeal  of  this  Hymn  is  potent  and  the  myth 
is  of  unusual  beauty  symbolizing  the  death  and  re¬ 
birth  of  vegetation.  Very  different,  but  extremely  de¬ 
lightful,  is  the  serio-comic  Hymn  to  Hermes ,  which 
describes  in  detail  the  mischievous  adventures  of  the 
rascally  infant  Hermes: 

The  babe  was  born  at  the  first  peep  of  day; 

He  began  playing  on  the  lyre  at  noon; 

And  the  same  evening  did  he  steal  away 

Apollo’s  herds. 

The  reader  is  strongly  urged  to  read  Shelley’s  suc¬ 
cessful  rendering  of  the  Hymns,  from  which  a  few 
lines  are  quoted  above. 


126 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


II.  Lyric  Poetry 

Lyric  Poetry  should  strictly  mean  only  poetry  sung 
to  the  lyre,  but  the  term  is  loosely,  although  conveni¬ 
ently,  used  to  designate  the  Elegiac,  Iambic,  and  Melic 
poetry  of  the  Greeks.  Lyric  poetry  followed  Epic  and 
flourished  particularly  during  the  seventh,  sixth,  and 
first  part  of  the  fifth  centuries  b.c.  It  was  the  natural 
result  of  profound  social  and  political  changes  through¬ 
out  Greek  lands  when  monarchies  were  being  succeeded 
by  oligarchies,  tyrannies,  and  democracies,  and  when 
colonies  were  being  sent  out,  commerce  was  being  ex¬ 
tended,  and,  most  important  of  all,  education  became 
more  general  and  men  began  to  think  for  themselves. 
Lyric  poetry  is  reflective  poetry.  The  Epic  bard  nar¬ 
rates;  the  Lyric  poet  sings  of  his  own  moods,  thoughts, 
or  reflections. 

The  remains  of  Greek  lyric  poetry  are  extremely 
scanty  and  tantalizing  in  their  fragmentary  character. 
We  possess  manuscripts  of  the  poetry  of  Theognis, 
Pindar,  and  Bacchylides,  but  most  of  these  singers  so 
famous  in  antiquity  are  now  represented  by  mere 
snatches,  the  chance  quotations  of  later  writers.  How 
disappointing  this  is  in  the  case  of  a  Sappho  or  an 
Archilochus,  an  Alcaeus  or  a  Stesichorus! 

Lyric  poetry  was  composed  by  poets  in  the  three  chief 
dialects  (Aeolic,  Doric,  and  Ionic),  but  elegy  originated 
in  Ionia.  The  term  elegy,  which  seems  to  have  been 
a  non-Greek  word  applied  to  a  plaintive  song  accompan¬ 
ied  by  the  flute,  is  used  of  reflective  poetry  composed 
in  the  elegiac  couplet.  This  couplet,  or  distich,  con¬ 
sists  of  a  dactylic  hexameter  followed  by  a  shorter 
line,  the  so-called  dactylic  pentameter.  The  effect  is 
striking;  as  Puttenham  in  his  Arte  of  English  Poesie 
(15)  says,  it  is  “  a  pitious  manner  of  meetre,  placing  a 
limping  Pentameter  after  a  lusty  Exameter,  which 
made  it  go  dolourously  more  than  any  other  meetre.” 
Readers  of  Catullus  are  familiar  with  his  beautiful  ode 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


127 


in  elegiac  verse  written  at  his  brother’s  tomb,  begin¬ 
ning: 

Multas  per  gentes  et  multa  per  aequora  vectus 
Advenio  has  miseras,  frater,  ad  inferias. 

Elegy  was  first  used  by  Callinus  of  Ephesus  (begin¬ 
ning  of  the  seventh  century  b.c.)  in  martial  verses 
whose  aim  was  to  arouse  his  sluggish  fellow-citizens 
against  the  invaders,  and  also  by  Tyrtaeus  (seventh 
century)  at  Sparta.  The  apocryphal  story  is  told  that 
Tyrtaeus  was  an  Athenian,  a  lame  school-master,  sent 
to  Lacedaemon  as  a  joke  when  the  Spartans  asked  for 
aid  against  their  powerful  neighbors,  the  Messenians. 
But  his  stirring  lines  put  new  life  in  the  soldiers,  who 
speedily  won  the  victory.  Here  are  the  first  lines  of 
one  of  his  poems,  as  translated  by  Thomas  Campbell: 

How  glorious  fall  the  valiant,  sword  in  hand 
In  front  of  battle  for  their  native  land! 

But  oh!  What  ills  await  the  wretch  that  yields, 

A  recreant  outcast  from  his  country’s  fields! 

The  mother  whom  he  loves  shall  quit  her  home, 

An  aged  father  at  his  side  shall  roam; 

His  little  ones  shall  weeping  with  him  go, 

And  a  young  wife  participate  his  woe; 

While  scorned  and  scowled  upon  by  every  face, 

They  pine  for  food,  and  beg  from  place  to  place. 


Elegy  was  first  used  for  the  expression  of  love  by 
the  Ionian  Mimnermus  (seventh  century),  who  thus 
was  the  father  of  the  erotic  elegy,  a  literary  form  much 
used  by  the  Greek  poets  of  the  Alexandrian  age  and 
popular  among  the  Romans,  e.g.,  Catullus,  Ovid,  Pro¬ 
pertius,  and  Tibullus.  The  verse  of  Mimnermus  is 
smooth  and  facile,  but  his  character  as  revealed  by 
poetical  fragments  which  we  possess  is  more  Asiatic 
than  Greek.  He  is  a  poet  of  pleasure  and  of  indolence 
continually  obsessed  by  the  fear  of  sickness,  old  age, 
and  death: 

What’s  life  or  pleasure  wanting  Aphrodite? 

When  to  the  gold-haired  goddess  cold  am  I, 

When  love  and  love’s  soft  gifts  no  more  delight  me, 

Nor  stolen  dalliance,  then  I  fain  would  die! 


128 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Ah!  fair  and  lovely  bloom  the  flowers  of  youth; 

On  men  and  maids  they  beautifully  smile: 

But  soon  comes  doleful  eld,  who,  void  of  ruth, 
Indifferently  afflicts  the  fair  and  vile: 

Then  cares  wear  out  the  heart;  old  eyes  forlorn 
Scarce  reck  the  very  sunshine  to  behold  — 

Unloved  by  youths,  of  every  maid  the  scorn, 

So  hard  a  lot  God  lays  upon  the  old. 

—  J.  A.  Symonds,  Sr. 


Mimnermus’  prayer  was  to  die  at  the  age  of  sixty, 
free  from  disease  and  grievous  pains.  For  this  wish 
he  was  rebuked  by  the  wise  Solon  (author  of  the  famous 
saying:  “  I  grow  old  always  learning  many  things  ”) 
who  substituted  eighty  for  sixty. 

Solon  (600  b.c.),  the  Athenian  law-giver,  used  the 
elegiac  couplet  for  his  political  moralizing,  and  Xenoph¬ 
anes  employed  it  for  philosophical  and  ethical  pro¬ 
nouncements.  Xenophanes  is  discussed  more  fully  in 
the  chapters  on  Philosophy  and  Religion. 

Moral  or  Gnomic  Elegy,  the  aim  of  which  was  pri¬ 
marily  to  instruct,  to  advise,  or  to  admonish,  embel¬ 
lished  with  many  proverbs  or  sententious  sayings,  is 
best  represented  by  Theognis  of  Megara  (sixth  century 
b.c.) .  Some  1400  lines  of  his  poetry  are  extant.  Much 
of  this  was  addressed  to  a  young  friend  named  Cyrnus. 
In  the  following  lines  Theognis  celebrates  the  immor¬ 
tality  which  his  songs  will  confer  on  Cyrnus: 

'  Lo,  I  have  given  thee  plumes  wherewith  to  skim 
The  unfathomed  deep,  and  lightly  hover  around 
Earth’s  huge  circumference.  Thou  shalt  be  found 
At  banquets  on  the  breath  of  paean  and  hymn: 

To  shrill-voiced  pipes  with  lips  of  seraphim 
Lovely  young  men  thy  rapturous  fame  shall  sound: 

Yea,  when  thou  best  lapped  in  the  noiseless  ground, 

Thy  name  shall  live,  nor  shall  oblivion  dim 

Thy  dawn  of  splendour.  For  these  lands,  these  isles, 

These  multitudinous  waves  of  refluent  seas, 

Shall  be  thy  pleasure-ground  wherethrough  to  roam, 

Borne  by  no  steed,  but  wafted  by  the  smiles 
Of  Muses  violet-crowned,  whose  melodies, 

While  earth  endures,  shall  make  all  earth  thy  home. 

—  Symonds. 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


129 


Iambic  poetry  was  “  invented/’  as  the  Greeks  said, 
or  perfected,  as  we  should  express  it,  by  Archilochus  of 
Paros  (seventh  century  b.c.).  The  iambic  line  con¬ 
sists  of  six  iambic  feet  or  their  equivalent,  and  became 
the  standard  line  for  the  dialogue  parts  of  the  Greek 
drama.  Little  is  left  to  us  of  the  poetry  of  Archilochus, 
whose  fame  in  antiquity  was  very  great.  Unhappy  in 
love  and  poor  in  purse  he  was  a  soldier  of  fortune, 
meeting  death  in  war.  How  he  lost  his  shield  in  battle 
he  playfully  relates  in  a  few  lines  translated  thus  by 
Professor  Shorey: 

Some  Thracian  strutteth  with  my  shield, 

For,  being  somewhat  flurried, 

I  left  it  by  a  wayside  bush 
As  from  the  field  I  hurried; 

A  right  good  targe,  but  I  got  off; 

The  deuce  may  take  my  shield; 

I’ll  get  another  just  as  good 
When  next  I  go  afield. 

This  humorous  confession  that  discretion  is  the 
better  part  of  valor  was  imitated  by  Alcaeus  and  Anac¬ 
reon  and  even  by  Horace  {Odes,  2.7.)  in  his  “  little 
shield  ingloriously  left  behind  ”  ( relicta  non  bene  for¬ 
mula)  at  Philippi. 

Archilochus  wrote  also  in  elegiac  and  trochaic 
measures.  It  is  surprising  to  find  in  a  Greek  poet  of 
this  early  date  these  subjective  verses,  an  apostrophe 
to  his  own  soul : 

Tossed  on  a  sea  of  troubles,  Soul,  my  Soul, 

Thyself  do  thou  control; 

And  to  the  weapons  of  advancing  foes 
A  stubborn  breast  oppose; 

Undaunted  ’mid  the  hostile  might 
Of  squadrons  burning  for  the  fight. 

Thine  be  no  boasting  when  the  victor’s  crown 
Wins  the  deserved  renown; 

Thine  no  dejected  sorrow  when  defeat 
Would  urge  a  base  retreat! 

Rejoice  in  joyous  things  —  nor  overmuch 

Let  grief  thy  bosom  touch 

’Midst  evil,  and  still  bear  in  mind, 

How  changeful  are  the  ways  of  human  kind. 

—  William  Hay. 


130 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Iambic  and  elegiac  poetry  might  be  merely  recited  or 
declaimed,  but  melic  verse  (lyric  poetry  proper)  of 
necessity  was  sung  to  the  accompaniment  of  the  lyre. 
Melic  poetry  was  of  two  forms,  monodic  (composed  for 
one  voice),  a  favorite  of  the  Aeolians  and  choral ,  de¬ 
veloped  by  the  Dorians.  Choral  poetry  was  composed 
for  a  chorus,  and  dancing  accompanied  the  singing  and 
the  music. 

The  Aeolian  isle  of  Lesbos  was  the  home  of  a  great 
school  of  singers  represented  by  Terpander,  Alcaeus, 
and  Sappho.  Tradition  attributed  the  invention  of  the 
seven-stringed  lyre  to  Terpander  (seventh  century  b.c.) 
of  whose  poetry  only  a  few  lines  have  come  down  to 
us. 

The  renown  of  Alcaeus  (end  of  seventh  century  b.c..) 
was  great.  He  was  of  the  nobility  and  led  a  life  of 
peril  in  struggling  against  the  tyrants,  Pittacus  and 
Myrsilus,  in  his  native  city  of  Mytilene.  His  hardships 
in  war,  exile,  and  travel  by  land  and  sea,  reflected  in 
his  poems,  are  aptly  referred  to  by  Horace  {Odes,  2. 
13),  dura  navis,  dura  jugae  mala,  dura  belli.  Famous 
is  the  allegory  of  Alcaeus  of  the  Ship  of  State  with  refer¬ 
ence  to  the  distress  of  Mytilene  under  the  tyrant, 
Myrsilus,  a  poem  which  served  Horace  (1.14)  as 
model:  O  Navis,  referent  in  mare  te  novi  fluctus! 

An  example  of  a  drinking-song  by  Alcaeus  may  be 
given: 

The  rain  of  Zeus  descends,  and  from  high  heaven 
A  storm  is  driven: 

And  on  the  running  water-brooks  the  cold 
Lays  icy  hold: 

Then  up!  beat  down  the  winter;  make  the  fire 
Blaze  high  and  higher; 

Mix  wine  as  sweet  as  honey  of  the  bee 
Abundantly; 

Then  drink  with  comfortable  wool  around 
Your  temples  bound. 

We  must  not  yield  our  hearts  to  woe,  or  wear 
With  wasting  care; 

For  grief  will  profit  us  no  whit,  my  friend, 

Nor  nothing  mend; 

But  this  is  our  best  medicine,  with  wine  fraught 
To  cast  out  thought. 


—  Symonds. 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


131 


With  this  must  be  compared  Horace  (1.9) :  Vides  ut 
alt  a  stet  nive  candidum  Soracte,  etc. 

Too  little  remains,  however,  of  the  verse  of  Alcaeus 
to  reveal  to  us  that  magnificence,  grace,  and  force 
which,  as  ancient  critics  assert,  were  characteristics  of 
his  style. 

Sappho  was  also  of  Lesbos  and  lived  at  the  beginning 
of  the  sixth  century  b.c.  Of  her  life  we  know  little. 
Comedy  and  late  tradition  made  her  the  target  for  un¬ 
warranted  scandal  and  contumely.  It  is  not  surprising 
that  because  of  her  great  fame  legends  and  fanciful 
tales  gathered  about  her  name.  Not  only  Alcaeus,  but, 
regardless  of  chronological  possibilities,  Archilochus, 
Hipponax,  and  Anacreon  were  said  to  have  been  her 
lovers.  We  are  told  that  when  her  love  for  a  youth 
Phaon  was  spurned  she  threw  herself  from  the  Leucad- 
ian  rock  —  hundreds  of  miles  from  Lesbos,  it  may  be 
observed ! 

Sappho  seems  to  have  been  married,  to  have  had  a 
daughter,  and,  even  to  have  suffered  exile  in  the 
political  disturbances  of  the  time.  From  her  poetry  it 
would  seem  that  she  taught  girls  of  Lesbos  in  poetry 
and  music  and  that  she  felt  for  them  the  greatest  in¬ 
terest  and  affection.  The  poetic  genius  of  Sappho  has 
been  acclaimed  by  all  critics  ancient  and  modern. 
Plato  called  her  “  the  tenth  muse,”  and  Strabo  speaks 
of  her  as  “  a  marvel  —  in  all  history  you  will  find  no 
woman  who  can  challenge  comparison  with  her  even  in 
the  slightest  degree.”  The  loss  of  Sappho’s  poems  is 
one  of  the  most  cruel  disappointments  in  literature. 
Antiquity  possessed  no  less  than  nine  books  of  her 
verse;  we  have  but  a  few  poems,  largely  fragmentary. 
In  these  scanty  remains,  however,  it  is  possible  to  dis¬ 
cern  her  remarkable  gifts.  Her  poems  are  of  profound 
emotional  intensity;  her  verse  is  graceful,  polished, 
and  melodious  and  the  meters  are  varied.  The  stanza 
perfected  by  her,  the  Sapphic,  is  a  favorite  of  Horace. 
The  themes  of  her  Muse  are  love  and  beauty,  odes  to 
Aphrodite,  and  epithalamia  or  wedding-songs.  Trans- 


132 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


lation,  never  wholly  satisfactory,  lamentably  fails  to 
do  justice  to  Sappho’s  verse.  That  the  reader  may 
get  some  idea  of  her  poetry  several  versions  are  ap¬ 
pended  : 

Prayer  to  Aphrodite 

Glittering-throned,  undying  Aphrodite, 

Wile-weaving  daughter  of  high  Zeus,  I  pray  thee, 

Tame  not  my  soul  with  heavy  woe,  dread  mistress, 

Nay,  nor  with  anguish! 

But  hither  come,  if  ever  erst  of  old  time 
Thou  didst  incline,  and,  listenedst  to  my  crying, 

And  from  thy  father’s  palace  down  descending, 

Camest  with  golden 

Chariot  yoked:  thee  fair  swift-flying  sparrows 
Over  dark  earth  with  multitudinous  fluttering, 

Pinion  on  pinion,  thorough  middle  ether 
Down  from  heaven  hurried. 

Quickly  they  came  like  light,  and  thou,  best  lady, 

Smiling  with  clear  undying  eyes  didst  ask  me 
What  was  the  woe  that  troubled  me,  and  wherefore 
I  had  cried  to  thee: 

What  thing  I  longed  for  to  appease  my  frantic 

Soul;  and  whom  now  must  I  persuade,  thou  askedst, 

Whom  must  entangle  to  thy  love,  and  who  now, 

Sappho,  hath  wronged  thee? 

Yea,  for  if  now  he  shun,  he  soon  shall  choose  thee; 

Yea,  if  he  take  not  gifts,  he  soon  shall  give  them; 

Yea,  if  he  love  not,  soon  shall  he  begin  to 
Love  thee,  unwilling. 

Come  to  me  now  too,  and  from  tyrannous  sorrow 
Free  me,  and  all  things  that  my  soul  desires  to 
Have  done,  do  for  me,  queen,  and  let  thyself  too 
Be  my  great  ally. 

—  Symonds. 


The  Moon 

The  stars  about  the  lovely  moon 
Fade  back  and  vanish  very  soon, 

When,  round  and  full,  her  silver  face 
Swims  into  sight,  and  lights  all  space. 

—  Edwin  Arnold. 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


133 


Atthis 

I  loved  thee  once,  Atthis,  long  ago. 

—  Cp.  Swinburne,  Songs  of  the  Springtides. 


Neglect  of  the  Muses 

Yea,  thou  shalt  die, 

And  lie 

Dumb  in  the  silent  tomb; 

Nor  of  thy  name 
Shall  there  be  any  fame 

In  ages  yet  to  be  or  years  to  come: 

For  of  the  flowering  Rose, 

Which  on  Pieria  blows, 

Thou  hast  no  share: 

But  in  sad  Hades’  house, 

Unknown,  inglorious, 

’Mid  the  dim  shades  that  wander  there 
Shalt  thou  flit  forth  and  haunt  the  filmy  air. 

—  Symonds. 


A  Combination  from  Sappho 

i 

Like  the  sweet  apple  which  reddens  upon  the  topmost  bough, 

A-top  on  the  topmost  twig,  —  which  the  pluckers  forgot,  somehow, — 
Forgot  it  not,  nay,  but  got  it  not,  for  none  could  get  it  till  now. 

ii 

Like  the  wild  hyacinth  flower  which  on  the  hill  is  found, 

Which  the  passing  feet  of  the  shepherds  for  ever  tear  and  wound, 
Until  the  purple  blossom  is  trodden  into  the  ground. 

—  D.  G.  Rossetti. 

Anacreon  of  Teos  (latter  part  of  the  sixth  century 
B.c.),  an  Ionian,  was  a  poet  of  pleasure.  The  remains 
of  his  graceful  and  elegant  verse  are  scanty.  His  fame 
among  English  readers  rests  upon  the  popularity  of  the 
Anacreontics  as  translated  by  Thomas  Moore  and  Cow¬ 
ley.  But  these  pretty  Alexandrian  verses  were  com¬ 
posed  centuries  after  the  real  Anacreon. 

The  Dorian  school  of  choral  poets  is  represented  by 
Aleman  and  Stesichorus.  Aleman  was  born  at  Sardes  in 
Lydia,  but  his  literary  activity  centered  at  Sparta.  He 


134 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


was  famous  for  his  Partheneia  or  choral  dance-songs 
for  maidens.  It  is  probable  that  to  Aleman  we  owe  the 
full  development  of  the  choral  ode  into  the  division  of 
strophe,  antistrophe,  and  epode. 

The  poetic  remains  of  Stesichorus  of  Sicily  are  ex¬ 
tremely  slight.  For  his  real  name,  Tisias,  the  designa¬ 
tion  Stesichorus  —  “  Marshal  of  the  chorus  ”  —  was 
substituted.  The  poetry  of  this  “  lyric  Homer  ”  was  ex¬ 
tremely  popular  and  greatly  influenced  tragedy  and  art. 
Famous  in  antiquity  was  his  Palinode  or  Recantation  to 
Helen.  Threatened  with  blindness  because  of  his 
verses  blaming  Helen,  now  deified,  he  recanted  in  verses 
beginning  thus: 

“  This  story  is  not  true.  Thou  didst  not  go  in  the  well-benched 
ships,  nor  didst  thou  come  to  the  citadel  of  Troy.” 

The  very  existence  of  Arion  of  Corinth,  a  Lesbian  by 
birth,  has  been  doubted,  although  ancient  testimony 
attributed  to  him  the  elaboration  of  the  dithyramb,  the 
choral  hymn  to  Dionysus,  from  which  tragedy  devel¬ 
oped. 

The  lyric  poetry  of  Simonides  of  Ceos,  a  contem¬ 
porary  of  the  Persian  wars  and  long  a  resident  of 
Athens,  achieved  perfection  of  form  and  great  variety. 
His  epitaphs,  or  elegies  in  praise  of  the  Greek  heroes 
who  fell  in  the  Persian  wars,  are  of  remarkable  beauty 
and  power.  Familiar  is  the  couplet  on  the  Spartans 
who  fell  at  Thermopylae: 

Go,  tell  the  Spartans,  thou  that  passest  by, 

That  here  obedient  to  their  laws  we  lie. 

—  Bowles. 

Cicero’s  translation  ( Tusc .  Disp.  i.  ioi)  is  of  interest: 

Die,  hospes,  Spartae,  nos  te  hie  vidisse  iacentes, 
dum  sanctis  patriae  legibus  obsequimur. 

Admirable  is  an  encomium  by  Simonides  on  the  same 
theme : 

Of  those  who  died  at  Thermopylae  glorious  is  the  fate  and  fair 
the  doom;  their  grave  is  an  altar;  instead  of  lamentation,  they  have 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


135 


endless  fame;  their  dirge  is  a  chant  of  praise.  Such  winding-sheet  as 
theirs  no  rust,  no,  nor  all-conquering  time,  shall  bring  to  nought.  But 
this  sepulchre  of  brave  men  hath  taken  for  its  habitant  the  glory  of 
Hellas.  Leonidas  is  witness,  Sparta’s  king,  who  hath  left  a  mighty 
crown  of  valour  and  undying  fame.  —  Symonds. 

The  versatility  of  Simonides’  genius  is  shown  in 
one  of  the  most  beautiful  lyrics  in  Greek  poetry,  the 
Lament  of  Danae.  The  young  mother  Danae,  with  her 
infant  son  Perseus,  has  been  set  afloat  upon  the  sea 
to  die: 

When,  in  the  carven  chest, 

The  winds  that  blew  and  waves  in  wild  unrest 
Smote  her  with  fear,  she,  not  with  cheeks  unwet 
Her  arms  of  love  round  Perseus  set, 

And  said,  O  child,  what  grief  is  mine! 

But  thou  dost  slumber,  and  thy  baby  breast 
Is  sunk  in  rest, 

Here  in  the  cheerless  brass-bound  bark, 

Tossed  amid  starless  night  and  pitchy  dark. 

Nor  dost  thou  heed  the  scudding  brine 
Of  waves  that  wash  above  thy  curls  so  deep, 

Nor  the  shrill  winds  that  sweep, — 

Wrapped  in  thy  purple  robe’s  embrace, 

Fair  little  face! 

But  if  this  dread  were  dreadful  too  to  thee, 

Then  wouldst  thou  lend  thy  listening  ear  to  me; 
Therefore  I  cry,  Sleep,  babe,  and  sea,  be  still, 

And  slumber  our  unmeasured  ill! 

Oh,  may  some  change  of  fate,  sire  Zeus,  from  thee 
Descend,  our  woes  to  end! 

But  if  this  prayer,  too  overbold,  offend 
Thy  justice,  yet  be  merciful  to  me! 

—  Symonds. 

The  beauty  and  pathos  of  these  lines  enable  us  to 
understand  Horace’s  reference  ( Odes  II.  i.  38.)  Ceae 
munera  neniae ;  Catullus  (38.  8)  maestius  lacrimis 
Simonideis;  and  Wordsworth’s  “  or  unroll/One  pre¬ 
cious  tender-hearted  scroll/Of  pure  Simonides.” 

Bacchylides  was  the  nephew  of  Simonides,  and 
achieved  fame  in  the  province  of  Pindar,  in  the  writing 
of  odes  in  praise  of  victors  in  the  athletic  games.  In 
1897  some  twenty  of  his  poems  were  discovered  in 
Egypt  and  these  reveal  Bacchylides  as  a  poet  of  merit, 
although  inferior  both  to  Simonides  and  to  Pindar. 


136 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Pindar,  of  Thebes,  who  flourished  during  the  first 
half  of  the  fifth  century  b.c.,  was  regarded  by  antiquity 
as  the  greatest  Greek  lyric  poet.  To  this  place  of  pre¬ 
eminence  his  claims  are  legitimate,  yet  a  few  modern 
critics  are  disposed  without  good  reason  to  question  it. 
Although  Pindar  won  fame  in  the  composition  of  choral 
lyrics  of  every  type,  we  possess  the  Epinicia  only,  tri¬ 
umphal  odes  written  to  commemorate  victors  and  vic¬ 
tories  in  the  four  great  Hellenic  festival  games.  These 
poems  are  magnificent.  They  are  original  in  invention, 
architectonic  in  structure,  and  brilliant  in  execution. 
Pindar’s  diction  is  vivid,  rich,  and  varied,  his  epithets 
and  figures  striking.  His  verse  is  not  easy  reading  and 
it  is  at  times  somewhat  obscure.  In  some  respects  he 
may  be  called  a  poet’s  poet,  and  he  may  be  aptly  char¬ 
acterized  by  his  own  words,  “  to  the  many  he  needs 
interpreters.”  To  appreciate  Pindar  at  his  real  worth 
is  impossible  for  us  today.  We  lack  the  accompanying 
music  and  the  choral  dance,  we  miss  the  voices  of  the 
singers  and  their  costumes,  nor  can  we  envisage  the 
festal  scene  on  the  occasion  of  the  celebration  of  the 
victory  for  which  Pindar  had  composed  the  song.  Even 
the  best  English  translation,  therefore,  does  injustice 
to  the  Theban  lyricist,  Horace’s  “  Dircaean  swan.” 

III.  The  Attic  Period 

The  genius  of  the  Athenians  came  to  rich  literary 
fruition  in  the  fifth  and  fourth  centuries  b..c.  The  Epic 
poetry  of  the  minstrels  had  flourished  throughout  Greek 
lands,  a  form  of  expression  suited  to  the  social  condi¬ 
tions  of  that  early  age.  A  different  political,  social, 
and  religious  background  inspired  lyric  poetry.  At 
Athens  in  the  period  subsequent  to  the  Persian  Wars, 
when  a  mighty  effort  had  prevailed  against  the  great 
peril  from  Asia,  the  rise  of  the  democracy  and  the 
spread  of  general  education  stimulated  remarkable 
literary  activity  in  varied  forms.  The  literary  and 
other  artistic  achievements  of  this  era  cause  the  Attic 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


137 


Period  to  rank  with  the  few  outstanding  periods  in  the 
history  of  human  civilization.  In  poetry,  the  drama  — 
both  tragedy  and  comedy  —  flourished.  In  prose,  early 
and  comparatively  crude  efforts  were  quickly  succeeded 
by  mastery  in  the  writing  of  history,  rhetoric  and  ora¬ 
tory,  and  philosophy. 

Athenian  dramatic  and  philosophical  literature  are 
discussed  elsewhere  in  this  volume.  It  remains  to  treat 
of  history,  rhetoric  and  oratory. 

History 

As  compared  with  verse  Greek  prose  was  of  slow  de¬ 
velopment.  If  we  disregard  early  Ionian  chroniclers 
and  compilers  whose  writings  are  largely  lost,  the  first 
important  name  is  that  of  Herodotus  of  the  fifth  cen¬ 
tury  b.c.,  the  “  Father  of  History.”  Although  Herodo¬ 
tus  was  born  at  Halicarnassus,  a  city  of  Asia  Minor,  he 
spent  much  time  in  Athens.  Herodotus  laid  a  founda¬ 
tion  for  the  writing  of  his  great  history  of  the  growth 
of  Persia  and  her  wars  with  Greece  by  extensive  travel 
to  Babylon  and  Egypt,  to  the  Euxine,  through  Greece 
and  the  islands,  and  to  Magna  Graecia.  The  nine  books 
of  his  chronicle,  written  in  the  Ionic  dialect,  are  com¬ 
posed  in  a  style  which  has  great  charm  and  lucidity, 
although  it  is  loose  in  structure  and  parenthetical. 
Herodotus  is  not  a  critical  or  scientific  historian  in  the 
modern  sense,  but  his  work,  properly  estimated,  is  of 
the  greatest  value.  He  is,  too,  a  veritable  prince  of 
story-tellers  and  his  pages  are  enlivened  by  many  en¬ 
tertaining  anecdotes,  such  as  the  Ring  of  Polycrates, 
the  tale  of  Hippoclides,  and  the  story  of  the  minstrel 
Arion.  The  many  pages  descriptive  of  the  customs  of 
Lydians,  Babylonians,  and  Egyptians  are  of  absorbing 
interest.  In  his  writings  there  is  to  be  observed  a  reli¬ 
gious  feeling  akin  to  that  of  Aeschylus.  The  downfall 
of  the  Persians  Herodotus  ascribes  to  Nemesis,  the 
righteous  wrath  of  Heaven,  which  justly  brings  ruin 
upon  those  of  overweening  ambition  who  wax  fat  and 
insolent;  verily,  pride  goeth  before  a  fall. 


138 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Thucydides,  in  his  History  of  the  Peloponnesian  War 
in  eight  books,  has  a  different  conception  of  the  histo¬ 
rian’s  task.  He  was  a  participant  as  one  of  the  Athen¬ 
ian  generals  in  the  long  struggle  between  Athens  and 
Sparta  (431—404  b.c.),  but  lost  his  command  in  424 
B-c.  and  lived  in  exile  for  the  remainder  of  the  war. 
For  his  history  he  engaged  in  long  and  careful  study 
and  travel  and  strove  to  give  not  only  an  accurate  ac¬ 
count  of  the  actual  events  of  the  war  but  also  their 
causes.  He  therefore  used  documents  and  treaties  as 
evidence,  and,  as  he  wrote  with  remarkable  freedom 
from  prejudice  and  bias,  his  work  stands  as  the  first 
critical  history.  If  Herodotus  is  the  Father  of  His¬ 
tory,  Thucydides  is  the  first  philosophical  historian. 
The  style  of  Thucydides  is  somewhat  austere,  at  times 
obscure,  and  reflects  the  rhetorical  tendencies  of  the 
time*  Prominent  in  his  work  are  the  speeches  which 
he  attributes  to  the  chief  personages  who  find  place  in 
his  history.  One  who  wishes  to  gain  some  idea  of  the 
skill  of  Thucydides  as  a  narrator  and  of  his  merit  as 
a  historian  should  read,  after  the  introductory  para¬ 
graphs,  the  whole  of  the  splendid  funeral  oration  of 
Pericles  (2.  41-43),  pronounced  over  the  Athenian 
dead  of  the  first  campaign  of  the  war,  next,  the  graphic 
description  (2.  49-53)  of  the  dreadful  plague  which 
caused  such  cruel  havoc  in  Athens  in  the  second  year 
of  the  war,  and  finally  the  account  of  the  unfortunate 
Sicilian  Expedition  of  the  Athenians. 

The  third  and  last  historian  of  the  Attic  Period  is 
Xenophon,  (born  about  431  b.c.)  the  author  of  the 
Hellenica  and  the  Anabasis.  Although  Xenophon  was 
born  in  Attica  and  was  a  pupil  and  admirer  of  Socrates, 
long  absence  from  Athens,  admiration  for  the  Spartan 
government,  and  military  service  in  the  Spartan  army 
caused  him  to  reside  near  Olympia.  In  the  Hellenica ,  a 
work  of  no  great  inspiration,  the  narration  of  Hellenic 
affairs  is  continued  from  the  conclusion  of  Thucydides’ 
history  down  to  the  battle  of  Mantinea,  in  362  b.c. 
The  Anabasis  is  a  composition  of  permanent  value  by 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


139 


reason  of  the  interest  of  the  subject  matter  and  the  at¬ 
tractiveness  of  the  style.  It  tells  the  story  of  the  march 
inland  into  Asia  of  the  10,000  Greek  mercenaries  under 
Cyrus,  the  young  Persian  Prince  in  search  of  a  throne, 
of  the  death  of  Cyrus  in  battle,  of  the  resourceful 
leadership  of  Xenophon  himself,  who  had  accompanied 
the  expedition,  and  the  adventurous  and  successful 
trip  home  of  the  Greek  soldiers.  Xenophon’s  Memor¬ 
abilia ,  or  Recollections  of  Socrates,  picture  the  Master 
on  the  personal  side  and  is  an  effort  to  defend  his  char¬ 
acter  and  teachings.  Minor  essays  of  Xenophon  are 
also  extant,  such  as  the  Cyropaedia  ( Education  of  Cy¬ 
rus)  and  the  treatise  On  Hunting. 

Rhetoric  and  Oratory 

We  come  now  to  the  consideration  of  Rhetoric  and 
Oratory  in  the  Attic  Period.  It  is  difficult  to  over¬ 
estimate  the  importance  of  rhetoric  and  oratory  in 
Greek  life  and  thought.  An  account  is  given  in  the 
chapter  on  Education  of  rhetoric  as  an  important  part 
of  higher  education.  In  the  Greek  sense  of  the  term 
rhetoric  has  a  much  broader  connotation  than  its 
modern  derivative.  We  think  of  rhetoric  as  merely 
written  composition;  to  the  Greek,  rhetoric  comprised 
oral  as  well  as  written  discourse.  It  was  oratory  in  a 
broad  sense.  The  pursuit  of  rhetoric  led  to  the  study 
of  grammar,  the  exact  meaning  of  words,  argumenta¬ 
tion,  figures  of  speech,  the  development  of  style,  and 
the  presentation  of  a  cause.  Rhetoric  was,  to  Aristotle, 
persuasion ,  or  the  manner  and  the  methods  whereby 
an  audience  is  won  over.  Its  field  was  that  of  knowl¬ 
edge  itself  and  as  an  instrument  of  instruction  it  was 
of  paramount  importance.  The  works  of  the  rhetori¬ 
cians  or  orators,  such  as  Isocrates  and  Demosthenes,  are 
highly  significant  to  us,  not  merely  because  of  their 
stylistic  influence  on  subsequent  prose,  but  also  because 
of  the  light  they  throw  upon  every  aspect  of  Athenian 
civilization.  In  the  discourses  of  the  Attic  orators  we 


140 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


obtain  contemporaneous  authentic  evidence  of  law  and 
government,  ethics  and  religion,  manners  and  customs. 

Two  factors  contributed  to  the  development  of  ora¬ 
tory  and  stylistic  Greek  prose:  the  Sicilian  rhetoric  from 
the  west,  as  taught  by  Corax,  Tisias,  and  Gorgias,  and 
the  influence  of  the  teachings  of  the  Sophists  from  the 
east.  The  former  influence  is  discussed  in  the  chapter 
on  Education,  while  the  Sophists  play  a  prominent  role 
in  both  education  and  philosophy  and  are  treated  under 
those  captions. 

Athens  of  the  latter  half  of  the  fifth  century  b.c., 
and  in  the  fourth,  took  the  keenest  interest  in  public 
speaking  and  rhetoric.  For  this,  there  were  many  rea¬ 
sons.  The  spoken,  not  the  written  word,  influenced 
the  minds  of  men  and  brought  fame  to  successful 
speakers.  Effective  speaking  was  the  desideratum  in 
the  Assembly,  the  Senate,  and  in  the  Law  Courts.  In 
fact,  in  the  courts,  litigants  were  compelled  by  law  to 
plead  in  person  their  causes.  All  men  are  not  thus 
gifted  by  nature.  Hence  arose  the  profession  of  logo- 
graphos ,  or  one  who  writes  speeches  for  others  to  de¬ 
liver,  a  profession  practiced  by  a  number  of  the  Attic 
orators. 

Any  history  of  Greek  oratory  must  begin  with 
Homer.  Speeches  comprise  over  half  of  the  Homeric 
Poems.  Eloquence  characterizes  the  utterances  of 
Achilles,  of  Nestor,  and  of  Odysseus. 

The  effective  discourses  of  the  Attic  orators,  how¬ 
ever,  are  the  result  of  native  ability  schooled  by  study 
and  discipline.  Of  the  many  orators  of  this  period  a 
list  of  the  ten  greatest  was  drawn  up  by  Alexandrian 
critics,  the  famous  Canon  of  the  Ten  Attic  Orators. 

Antiphon,  the  earliest,  and  the  first  speech-writer,  is 
represented  by  three  important  speeches  and  twelve 
rhetorical  exercises;  all  are  concerned  with  homicide. 
The  style  of  Antiphon  is  effective,  but  rugged  and 
austere. 

Andocides,  “  an  amateur/’  is  revealed  to  us  by  three 
extant  speeches,  of  which  the  best  and  most  interest- 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


141 


ing,  On  the  Mysteries,  deals  with  the  scandal  connected 
with  the  profanation  of  the  Eleusinian  Mysteries  and 
the  mutilation  of  the  statues  of  Hermes  in  415  b.c. 

Lysias  was  a  resident  alien  at  Athens,  a  wealthy 
young  man  of  excellent  education.  When  the  Thirty 
Tyrants  came  to  power  at  the  close  of  the  Peloponne¬ 
sian  War,  Lysias’  family  property  was  confiscated,  his 
brother  executed,  and  he  himself  narrowly  escaped 
death.  On  his  return  from  exile  after  the  democracy 
was  restored,  Lysias  adopted  the  profession  of  writer 
of  speeches  for  litigants.  Thirty-four  speeches  are  ex¬ 
tant  under  his  name;  of  these  the  longest  and  greatest, 
Against  Eratosthenes,  was  spoken  by  Lysias  himself 
on  the  occasion  of  the  trial  of  one  of  the  Thirty  Tyrants 
for  the  murder  of  his  brother.  Lysias  is  regarded  as  a 
master  of  the  Attic  idiom.  His  style  is  conspicuous  for 
simplicity,  lucidity,  purity  of  diction,  and  vividness. 
Lysias  is  most  famous,  however,  for  the  skill  and  success 
with  which  he  adapted  his  material  and  style  to  the 
characters  and  the  situations  of  the  speakers  for  whom 
he  composed  speeches. 

As  Isocrates  (436-338)  occupies  a  prominent  place 
in  Athenian  education  he  is  discussed  fully  in  the  chap¬ 
ter  devoted  to  that  subject.  He  was  a  Sophist  in  the 
best  sense  of  that  term  and  conducted  an  influential  and 
popular  school  for  over  fifty  years.  Because  of  tempera¬ 
mental  defects  he  was  not  a  public  speaker,  but  de¬ 
voted  himself  to  teaching  and  to  the  composition  of 
pamphlets  or  discourses,  in  which  he  aimed  to  make 
contributions  of  permanent  value.  Of  especial  interest 
are  the  Panegyricus —  his  masterpiece  (380  b.c.)  in 
which  he  expounds  his  cherished  political  idea,  viz.,  the 
subjugation  of  Asia  by  a  united  Hellas  —  and  the  dis¬ 
courses  called  Panathenaicus  and  Philip.  His  theory 
of  culture  is  elucidated  in  the  pamphlets  Against  the 
Sophists  and  On  the  Antidosis.  In  style,  Isocrates  is 
smooth  and  polished  and  his  periods  are  lengthy  and 
flowing.  Of  the  three  classes  of  rhetoric — namely, 
forensic,  deliberative,  and  epideictic  —  Isocrates’ 


142 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


preference  was  for  the  last  named.  The  influence  of 
Isocrates’  style  was  very  great  upon  subsequent  Greek 
prose  and  upon  Cicero,  and,  through  Cicero,  upon 
modern  literary  prose. 

Isaeus  specialized  in  the  writing  of  speeches  in  will- 
cases  and  of  these  discourses  eleven  are  extant. 

Demosthenes  (384-322)  is  the  greatest  of  all  the 
ancient  orators.  Ancient  and  modern  critics  alike  unite 
in  praise  of  his  oratorical  powers.  Other  orators  in  the 
Canon  possessed  special  virtues,  but  Demosthenes  was 
master  in  every  province  of  oratory. 

Demosthenes,  having  lost  his  patrimony  through  the 
dishonesty  of  his  guardians,  turned  to  professional 
speech-writing.  After  great  success  had  attended  him 
in  this  pursuit  he  assumed  an  active  part  in  public  life 
and  as  a  patriotic  statesman  strove  to  save  Athens  from 
the  Macedonian  peril.  In  the  three  Olynthiacs  and  the 
three  Philippics  Demosthenes  vigorously  opposed  Philip 
and  urged  his  fellow-citizens  to  more  active  resistance. 
But  his  efforts  were  largely  in  vain.  The  battle-field  of 
Chaeronea  (338  b.c.)  witnessed  the  triumph  of  Philip 
and  Alexander.  Demosthenes’  masterpiece  is  his 
famous  speech  On  the  Crown ,  in  which  the  orator- 
statesman  successfully  defended  his  whole  public 
career  and  convincingly  showed  himself  deserving  of 
the  golden  wreath  of  honor  which  his  envious  rival, 
Aeschines,  strove  to  have  withheld.  Translation  fails 
to  do  justice  to  the  virtues  of  the  style  of  Demosthenes. 
A  few  short  passages  from  the  Oration  On  the  Crown 
may  suggest  the  intensity  and  fire  of  the  great  orator: 

“  Having  by  these  means  brought  the  cities  into 
such  dispositions  towards  each  other,  Philip,  en¬ 
couraged  by  these  decrees  and  these  replies,  came  in 
his  strength,  and  seized  Elatea,  sure  that,  happen  what 
would,  we  and  the  Thebans  could  never  more  conspire. 
Enough  —  you  all  know  what  a  storm  then  awoke  in 
the  city.  Yet  listen  to  me  for  a  moment,  suffer  me  to 
give  you  the  barest  outline. 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


143 


“  It  was  evening  when  a  courier  came  to  the  presi¬ 
dents  with  the  news  that  Elatea  had  been  seized.  The 
presidents  instantly  rose  from  table  —  they  were  sup¬ 
ping  at  the  moment:  some  of  them  hastened  to  clear 
the  market-place  of  the  shopmen,  and  to  burn  the 
wickerwork  of  the  booths:  others,  to  send  for  the  Gen¬ 
erals  and  order  the  sounding  of  the  call  to  the  Asembly. 
The  city  was  in  a  tumult.  At  dawn  next  day  the  presi¬ 
dents  convoked  the  Senate,  you  hurried  to  the  Ecclesia, 
and  before  the  Senate  could  go  through  its  forms  or 
could  report,  the  whole  people  were  in  assembly  on  the 
hill.  Then,  when  the  Senate  had  come  in,  when  the 
presidents  had  reported  the  news  that  they  had  re¬ 
ceived  and  had  introduced  the  messenger,  who  told  his 
tale,  the  herald  repeatedly  asked,  Who  wishes  to 
speak?  But  no  one  came  forward.  Again  and  again  he 
put  the  question  —  in  vain.  No  one  would  rise,  though 
all  the  generals,  though  all  the  public  speakers  were 
present,  though  our  Country  was  crying  aloud,  with  the 
voice  that  comes  home  to  all,  for  a  champion  of  the 
commonwealth.  Yet,  if  they  should  have  come  for¬ 
ward  who  wished  Athens  safe,  every  man  in  this  court, 
ay,  every  man  in  Athens,  would  have  risen  and  moved 
towards  the  platform.  Every  man  of  you,  I  know  well, 
wished  the  city  to  be  saved.  .  .  .  But  no  —  it  seems 
that  that  crisis,  that  hour,  demanded  not  merely  a 
patriot,  but  a  man  who  had  followed  the  train  of 
events  from  the  beginning,  who  had  accurately 
reasoned  out  why  and  wherefore  Philip  was  acting 
thus.  A  man  who  did  not  know  this,  who  had  not 
made  it  the  subject  of  long  and  thorough  research, 
might  be  ever  so  loyal,  might  be  ever  so  rich,  but  he 
was  not  the  man  to  see  what  should  be  done  or  to 
direct  your  course.  Such  a  man  that  day  was  found 
in  me.  .  .  . 

“  Thus,  or  to  this  effect,  I  spoke,  and  left  the  plat¬ 
form.  Everyone  approved  —  there  was  not  a  dissenti¬ 
ent;  and  what  then?  I  did  not  make  a  speech  and  leave 
others  to  move  a  resolution.  I  did  not  move  a  resolu- 


144 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


tion  and  leave  others  to  go  on  an  embassy.  I  did  not 
go  on  an  embassy,  and  leave  others  to  persuade  the 
Thebans.  No.  I  went  through  with  the  business  from 
the  beginning  to  the  end ;  I  gave  myself  to  you  without 
reservation  in  face  of  the  perils  that  encompassed  the 
city.  .  .  . 

“  These  were  the  first  steps  towards  the  adjustment 
of  our  relations  to  Thebes,  at  a  time  when  enmity, 
hatred  and  distrust  had  been  sown  between  our  cities  by 
yonder  men.  The  people  gave  their  voice,  and  the 
danger  that  hung  upon  our  borders  went  by  like  a 
cloud.  .  .  . 

“  But  never,  Athenians,  never  can  it  be  said  that  you 
erred  when  you  took  upon  you  that  peril  for  the  free¬ 
dom  and  safety  of  all!  No,  by  our  fathers  who  met 
the  danger  at  Marathon,  no,  by  our  fathers  who  stood 
in  the  ranks  at  Plataea,  no,  by  our  fathers  who  did 
battle  on  the  waters  of  Salamis  and  Artemisium,  no, 
by  all  the  brave  who  sleep  in  tombs  at  which  their 
country  paid  those  last  honours  which  she  had  awarded, 
Aeschines,  to  all  of  them  alike,  not  alone  to  the  suc¬ 
cessful  or  the  victorious!  And  her  award  was  just.  The 
part  of  brave  men  had  been  done  by  all.  The  fortune 
experienced  by  the  individual  among  them  had  been 
allotted  by  a  Power  above  men.  .  .  .  ” 

Finally,  we  quote  the  eloquent  peroration  and  the 
noble  prayer  which  closes  the  speech: 

“  Here  is  the  proof.  Not  when  my  extradition  was 
demanded,  not  when  they  sought  to  arraign  me  before 
the  Amphictyonic  Council,  not  for  all  their  menaces  or 
their  offers,  not  when  they  set  these  villains  like  wild 
beasts  upon  me,  have  I  ever  been  untrue  to  the  loyalty 
I  bear  you.  From  the  outset,  I  chose  the  path  of  a 
straightforward  and  righteous  statesmanship,  to  cher¬ 
ish  the  dignities,  the  prerogatives,  the  glories  of  my 
country,  to  exalt  them,  to  stand  by  their  cause.  I  do 
not  go  about  the  market-place  radiant  with  joy  at  my 
country’s  disasters,  holding  out  my  hand  and  telling 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


145 


my  good  news  to  anyone  who,  I  think,  is  likely  to  re¬ 
port  it  in  Macedon;  I  do  not  hear  of  my  country’s 
successes  with  a  groan  and  a,  shudder  and  a  head  bent 
to  earth,  like  the  bad  men  who  pull  Athens  to  pieces,  as 
if,  in  so  doing,  they  were  not  tearing  their  own  reputa¬ 
tions  to  shreds,  who  turn  their  faces  to  foreign  lands, 
and,  when  an  alien  has  triumphed  by  the  ruin  of  the 
Greeks,  give  their  praises  to  that  exploit,  and  vow  that 
vigilance  must  be  used  to  render  that  triumph  eternal. 

“  Never,  Powers  of  Heaven,  may  any  brow  of  the  Im¬ 
mortals  be  bent  in  approval  of  that  prayer!  Rather,  if 
it  may  be,  breathe  even  into  these  men  a  better  mind 
and  heart;  but  if  so  it  is  that  to  these  can  come  no 
healing,  then  grant  that  these,  and  these  alone,  may 
perish  utterly  and  early  on  land  and  on  the  deep:  and, 
to  us,  the  remnant,  send  the  swiftest  deliverance  from 
the  terrors  gathered  above  our  heads,  send  us  the  sal¬ 
vation  that  stands  fast  perpetually.”  (Trans,  by  Jebb) 

The  remaining  four  orators  of  the  Canon  of  the  Ten 
are:  Aeschines,  an  eloquent  but  insincere  rival  of 
Demosthenes;  Lycurgus,  statesman  and  financier; 
Hyperides;  and  Dinarchus. 

IV.  The  Alexandrian  Period 

The  Alexandrian  Period  (300-146  b.c.)  was  an  age 
primarily  of  scholarship  and  criticism.  After  the  fourth 
century  b.c.,  Athens  was  no  longer  the  supreme  mistress 
of  Greece  in  literature  and  the  arts.  Athenian  political 
decline  inevitably  followed  Macedon’s  military  suprem¬ 
acy.  Alexander’s  conquest  of  Asia  and  Africa  spread 
Hellenic  culture  through  lands  formerly  “barbarian  ” 
and  gave  the  impulse  to  the  founding  and  rapid  growth 
of  new  Greek  cities.  Alexandria,  in  Egypt,  founded  by 
Alexander  in  332  b.c.  became  a  center  of  learning  with 
a  Museum  and  a  large  library  which  attracted  numer¬ 
ous  students,  scholars,  and  teachers.  Grammar  and 
lexicography  were  much  studied.  Editions  of  selected 


146 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


classical  writers  of  previous  centuries,  with  commen¬ 
taries,  were  industriously  produced  by  such  learned 
scholars  as  Zenodotus,  Aristophanes  of  Byzantium,  and 
Aristarchus,  all  of  whom  won  fame,  particularly  in  the 
study  of  the  Homeric  poems.  In  general,  however,  the 
creative  age  in  literature  had  passed.  Erudition, 
scholarship,  and  criticism  flourished  during  the  Alex¬ 
andrian  Period,  but  there  were  few  works  of  great 
originality  such  as  had  been  the  rule  during  the  Attic 
Period.  A  brilliant  exception  is  Theocritus,  of  the  third 
century  b.c.,  who  lived  in  Sicily,  in  Alexandria,  and  on 
the  Island  of  Cos. 

Theocritus  was  the  founder  of  a  new  literary  type, 
the  pastoral  idyll,  and  his  charming  Doric  bucolic  verses 
have  enjoyed  great  popularity  and  have  ever  pro¬ 
foundly  influenced  poetry  of  this  kind,  as,  for  example, 
the  Greek  poets,  Bion  and  Moschus,  in  their  poems,  the 
Lament  for  Adonis  and  the  Lament  for  Bion ,  the  Ro¬ 
man  poet  Vergil,  in  his  Bucolics  or  Eclogues  and,  in 
English,  the  pastorals  of  Milton,  Shelley,  Tennyson, 
and  many  others. 

Greek  pastoral  poetry  is  composed  in  the  dactylic 
hexameter  verse,  but  a  lyric  quality  was  secured  by  the 
use  of  a  refrain,  or  recurring  verses.  Certain  poetic 
conventions  are  peculiar  to  the  pastoral.  Rustics,  in 
alternating  competitive  verse,  sing  to  the  accompani¬ 
ment  of  the  shepherd’s  pipe  for  a  prize,  such  as  a  car- 
ven  cup  or  young  animal.  Unrequited  love  is  a  frequent 
theme,  a  special  favorite  being  the  tale  of  the  handsome 
young  shepherd  Daphnis,  who  pined  away  and  died  for 
love,  deeply  lamented  by  all  nature. 

The  first  idyll  of  Theocritus,  the  Death  of  Daphnis, 
is  the  most  beautiful,  perhaps,  of  his  pastorals.  The 
characters  are  Thyrsis  and  a  goatherd: 

Thyrsis.  Sweet  are  the  whispers  of  yon  pine  that  makes 
Low  music  o’er  the  spring,  and,  Goatherd,  sweet 
Thy  piping;  second  thou  to  Pan  alone. 

Is  his  the  horned  ram?  Then  thine  the  goat. 

Is  his  the  goat?  To  thee  shall  fall  the  kid; 

And  toothsome  is  the  flesh  of  unmilked  kids. 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


147 


Goatherd.  Shepherd,  thy  lay  is  as  the  noise  of  streams 
Falling  and  falling  aye  from  yon  tall  crag. 

If  for  their  meed  the  Muses  claim  the  ewe, 

Be  thine  the  stall-fed  lamb,  or  if  they  choose 
The  lamb,  take  thou  the  scarce  less-valued  ewe. 

Th.  Pray,  by  the  nymphs,  pray,  Goatherd,  seat  thee  here 
Against  this  hill-slope  in  the  tamarisk  shade, 

And  pipe  me  somewhat,  while  I  guard  thy  goats. 

Go.  I  durst  not,  Shepherd,  O  I  durst  not  pipe 
At  noontide,  fearing  Pan,  who  at  that  hour 
Rests  from  the  toil  of  hunting.  Harsh  is  he, 

Wrath  at  his  nostrils  aye  sits  sentinel. 

But,  Thyrsis,  thou  canst  sing  of  Daphnis’  woes; 

High  is  thy  name  for  woodland  minstrelsy. 


The  Song  of  Thyrsis 

Begin,  sweet  maids,  begin  the  woodland  song. 

The  voice  of  Thyrsis,  Aetna’s  Thyrsis  I. 

Where  were  ye,  Nymphs,  oh  where,  while  Daphnis  pined? 

In  fair  Peneus,  or  in  Pindus’  glens? 

For  great  Anapus’  stream  was  not  your  haunt, 

Nor  Aetna’s  cliff,  nor  Acis’  sacred  rill. 

Begin,  sweet  maids,  begin  the  woodland  song. 

O’er  him  the  wolves,  the  jackals  howled  o’er  him; 

The  lion  in  the  oak-copse  mourned  his  death. 

Begin,  sweet  maids,  begin  the  woodland  song. 

Forget,  sweet  maids,  forget  your  woodland  song. 

From  thicket  now  and  thorn  let  violets  spring. 

Now  let  white  lilies  drape  the  juniper, 

And  pines  grow  figs,  and  nature  all  go  wrong; 

For  Daphnis  dies.  Let  deer  pursue  the  hounds, 

And  mountain  owls  out-sing  the  nightingale. 

Forget,  sweet  maids,  forget  your  woodland  song. 

—  Trans,  by  Calverley. 

Some  of  the  idylls  of  Theocritus  are  not  purely  pas¬ 
toral.  The  fifteenth  idyll  is  dramatic,  a  highly  enter¬ 
taining  example  of  the  Mime  in  which  two  gossipy 
Syracusan  women  resident  in  Alexandria  attend  the 
festival  of  Adonis. 

Other  poets  of  the  Alexandrian  Age  are  the  erudite 
Callimachus,  of  Alexandria,  composer  of  hymns,  elegies, 
and  epigrams,  and  Apollonius  of  Rhodes,  author  of  the 
rather  artificial  epic,  the  Argonautica,  a  narrative  of 
Jason’s  voyage  in  search  of  the  golden  fleece.  In  this 


148 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


period  likewise  we  may  place  the  Mimes  of  Herondas, 
and  the  astronomical  verses  of  Aratus.  The  excellent 
history  written  by  Polybius  is  a  valuable  source  of  in¬ 
formation,  particularly  for  the  first  Punic  War. 

V.  The  Graeco-Roman  Age  (146  B.c-526  a.d.) 

There  is  no  sharp  line  of  delimitation  separating  the 
Alexandrian  from  the  Graeco-Roman  Age.  Literary,  or 
rather  scholarly,  activity  continued  to  flourish  without 
any  break  throughout  the  Greek  world  under  Roman 
sway,  or  rather,  let  us  say,  throughout  the  politically 
supreme  Roman  Empire,  dominated  by  Greek  culture. 
The  one  great  original  literary  genius  of  this  age  is 
Lucian,  of  the  second  century  a.d.,  the  pioneer  and 
master  in  a  new  field,  the  Romance.  Bom  in  Syria, 
he  traveled  and  studied  in  many  lands,  and  resided  for 
a  time  in  Athens.  Lucian  is  rhetorician,  satirist,  sceptic, 
and  wit  all  in  one.  Very  famous  are  his  entertaining 
satiric  dialogues,  Of  the  Dead ,  Of  the  Gods ,  and  Of  the 
Sea.  His  True  History ,  an  extravaganza  of  adventu¬ 
rous  travel,  is  the  prototype  of  the  tales  of  Baron 
Miinchhausen  and  Swift’s  Gulliver’s  Travels. 

Plutarch,  first  century  a.d.,  is  famous  for  his  biogra¬ 
phies  (the  Parallel  Lives )  and  for  his  work  called  the 
Morals .  Worthy  of  mention  are  the  geography  of 
Strabo  (first  century  b.c.,)  ,  the  guide-book  of  Pausanias 
(second  century  a.d.),  a  work  of  great  value  for  a 
knowledge  of  Greek  monuments  and  topography,  the 
general  history  of  Diodorus  Siculus,  the  excellent  liter¬ 
ary  criticism  of  Dionysius  of  Halicarnassus  (resident 
at  Rome  in  the  first  century  b.c.),  the  Pseudo- 
Longinus,  the  Roman  Histories  of  Appian  and  Cassius 
Dio,  the  historical  treatise  on  Alexander  by  Arrian,  the 
History  of  the  Jews  by  Josephus,  that  useful  miscellany 
the  Deipnosophistae  of  Athenaeus,  the  compilations  of 
Stobaeus,  the  medical  works  of  Galen,  and  the  Medita¬ 
tions  of  the  great  Stoic  Roman  Emperor,  Marcus 
Aurelius.  The  beginning  of  the  novel  should  also  be 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


149 


noted  in  the  romances  of  Longus,  Heliodorus,  and 
Achilles  Tatius. 

Our  brief  survey  of  Greek  literature  will  be  concluded 
with  a  few  words  concerning  the  Greek  Anthology 
(Garland  of  Flowers),  or  collections  of  epigrams,  which 
began  with  Meleager  (first  century  b.c.),  and  were 
augmented  by  Agathias  (sixth  century  a.d.).  This 
great  body  of  verse  was  further  increased  in  the  An¬ 
thology  of  Cephalas  (tenth  century  a.d.),  now  known 
as  the  Palatine  Anthology ,  and  the  Planudean  An¬ 
thology  (fourteenth  century).  In  these  large  collec¬ 
tions  we  possess  several  thousand  short  poems  or 
epigrams  (in  the  Greek  sense),  largely  in  the  elegiac 
meter,  dating  roughly  from  700  b.c..  to  1000  a.d.  Many 
of  their  little  poems  treating  of  Love,  Life,  Death, 
Fate,  etc.,  are  charming;  some  have  genuine  inspira¬ 
tion.  A  few  are  given  in  translation  to  illustrate  their 
nature: 

Plato 

Thou  wert  the  morning  star  among  the  living, 

Ere  thy  fair  light  had  fled; 

Now,  having  died,  thou  art,  as  Hesperus,  giving 
New  splendour  to  the  dead. 

—  Shelley. 


Plato 

Thou  gazest  on  the  stars,  my  star! 

Ah!  would  that  I  might  be 
Myself  those  skies  with  myriad  eyes, 

That  I  might  gaze  on  thee. 

—  Lilla  C.  Perry. 


Callimachus 
To  Heraclitus 

They  told  me,  Heraclitus,  they  told  me  you  were  dead; 

They  brought  me  bitter  news  to  hear  and  bitter  tears  to  shed. 
I  wept,  as  I  remembered,  how  often  you  and  I 
Had  tired  the  sun  with  talking  and  sent  him  down  the  sky. 

And  now  that  thou  art  lying,  my  dear  old  Carian  guest, 

A  handful  of  gray  ashes,  long,  long  ago  at  rest, 

Still  are  thy  pleasant  voices,  thy  nightingales,  awake, 

For  Death  he  taketh  all  away,  but  them  he  cannot  take. 


Cory. 


150 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Anonymous 

Of  our  great  love,  Parthenophil, 

This  little  stone  abideth  still 
Sole  sign  and  token: 

I  seek  thee  yet,  and  yet  shall  seek, 

Though  faint  mine  eyes,  my  spirit  weak 
With  prayers  unspoken. 

Meanwhile,  best  friend  of  friends,  do  thou, 

If  this  the  cruel  fates  allow, 

By  death’s  dark  river, 

Among  those  shadowy  people,  drink 
No  drop  for  me  on  Lethe’s  brink: 

Forget  me  never! 

—  Symonds. 


Meleager 

I’ll  twine  sweet  violets,  and  the  myrtle  green, 
Narcissus  will  I  twine,  and  lilies  sheen; 

I’ll  twine  sweet  crocus,  and  the  hyacinth  blue; 

And  last  I  twine  the  rose,  love’s  token  true: 

That  all  may  form  a  wreath  of  beauty,  meet 
To  deck  my  Heliodora’s  tresses  sweet. 

—  Goldwin  Smith. 


Simmias  of  Thebes 

Wind,  gentle  evergreen,  to  form  a  shade 
Around  the  tomb  where  Sophocles  is  laid; 

Sweet  ivy,  wind  thy  boughs,  and  intertwine 
With  blushing  roses  and  the  clustering  vine: 

Thus  will  thy  lasting  leaves,  with  beauties  hung, 

Prove  grateful  emblems  of  the  lays  he  sung; 

Whose  soul,  exalted  like  a  god  of  wit, 

Among  the  Muses  and  the  Graces  writ. 

—  Anonymous. 


Ion  of  Chios 

Hail,  dear  Euripides,  for  whom  a  bed 
In  black-leaved  vales  Pierian  is  spread: 

Dead  though  thou  art,  yet  know  thy  fame  shall  be 
Like  Homer’s,  green  through  all  eternity. 

—  Symonds. 


Democritus  (?) 

All  life’s  a  scene,  a  jest:  then  learn  to  play, 
Dismissing  cares,  or  bear  your  pains  alway. 


GREEK  LITERATURE 


151 


Paulus  Silentiarius 

My  name,  my  country  —  what  are  they  to  thee? 

What,  whether  base  or  proud  my  pedigree? 

Perhaps  I  far  surpassed  all  other  men; 

Perhaps  I  fell  below  them  all;  what  then? 

Suffice  it,  stranger!  that  thou  see’st  a  tomb; 

Thou  know’st  its  use;  it  hides  —  no  matter  whom. 

—  W.  Cowper. 


Agathias 

I  love  not  wine,  but  shouldst  thou  wish 
That  I  its  slave  might  be, 

Thou  needst  but  to  taste  the  cup, 

Then  hand  it  back  to  me. 

For  unto  me  that  cup  would  bring 
From  thy  dear  lips  a  kiss, 

And  while  I  drank  would  softly  tell 
How  it  received  such  bliss. 

—  Lilla  C.  Perry. 

Here  we  must  conclude  our  rapid  survey  of  Greek 
literature.  Only  the  skeleton  has  been  given,  which 
the  reader  will  clothe  for  himself  by  more  extensive 
reading.  For,  as  Lord  Bryce  has  said,  “  The  ancient 
writings  enter  into  and  have  done  much  to  instill  what 
is  best  in  modern  literature  and  are  the  common 
heritage  of  civilized  peoples,  the  permanent  founda¬ 
tion  on  which  the  republic  of  letters  has  been  built.  .  .  . 
Let  no  one  be  afraid  of  the  name,  ‘  dead  languages.’ 
No  language  is  dead  which  perfectly  conveys  thoughts 
that  are  alive  and  are  as  full  of  energy  now  as  they  ever 
were.  An  idea  or  feeling  grandly  expressed  lives  for¬ 
ever,  and  gives  immortality  to  the  words  that  enshrine 
it.” 


CHAPTER  XI 

ATHENIAN  EDUCATION 


IT  IS  the  actual  educational  practice  rather  than  the 
theory  with  which  we  are  most  concerned  in  this 
chapter  on  education  in  Athens.  Athenian  and 
Spartan  ideals  and  practice  in  education  were  very  dis¬ 
similar.  At  Sparta,  education  was  strictly  controlled 
by  the  State,  it  was  characterized  by  rigid  discipline 
in  all  respects,  and  it  was  largely  physical,  as  the  aim 
was  the  production  of  brave  and  hardy  soldiers.  Girls, 
as  well  as  boys,  received  a  rigorous  physical  training. 
In  short,  at  Sparta  education  was  military,  and  was 
based  on  the  theory  that  the  citizen  exists  primarily  for 
the  State. 

On  the  other  hand,  at  Athens,  a  democratic  commu¬ 
nity  where  it  was  believed  that  the  State  exists  for  the 
citizen,  a  wholly  different  ideal  was  dominant  —  that 
the  training  of  the  boy  should  be  for  citizenship  and 
for  living.  Such  an  education  involved  the  cultivation 
of  mind  even  more  than  of  body,  and  had  as  its  goal  the 
attainment  of  character,  taste,  and,  above  all,  sophro- 
syne ,  or  temperance,  moderation,  and  good-behavior 
in  word,  thought,  and  deed. 

This  striking  fact,  of  profound  importance  to  the 
modern  world,  is  to  be  observed  in  Athenian  education. 
Although  Athens  was  an  important  commercial  center, 
and,  although  trade,  industry,  and  arts  were  essential 
to  the  welfare  of  the  city-state,  yet  no  vocational  or 
technical  training  as  such  was  taught  in  the  schools. 
Technical  education  in  what  we  call  the  trades,  indus¬ 
tries,  and  professions  was  given  by  fathers  to  sons  and 
by  masters  to  apprentices  in  the  actual  work-shop  or 
factory.  Education,  to  the  Athenian,  was  a  training 
,  152 


ATHENIAN  EDUCATION 


153 


for  living  and  not  for  a  livelihood;  the  ideal  was  to  at¬ 
tain  health  of  mind  and  body,  and  not  to  gain  profi¬ 
ciency  in  trade,  arts  and  crafts,  and  money-making. 
Not  that  the  claims  and  importance  of  these  pursuits 
were  actually  ignored  or  despised  by  the  Athenians,  as  is 
sometimes  mistakenly  asserted.  But  training  in  these 
specialized  branches  was  regarded  as  something  to  be 
obtained  after  the  youth  had  laid  the  foundation  of  a 
liberal  training  for  living. 

At  Athens,  education  was  largely  a  private  matter. 
Some  exceptions,  however,  are  to  be  noted.  Certain 
large  gymnasia  and  palaestrae  were  built  and  main¬ 
tained  by  the  State,  which  were  open  to  the  public. 
The  sons  of  Athenian  citizens  who  had  fallen  in  battle 
were  supported  and  educated  by  the  State.  Free  train¬ 
ing  in  singing  and  dancing  provided  by  the  choregi  was 
given  to  some  750  boys  a  year  —  the  youths  who  com¬ 
posed  the  choruses  in  the  contests  at  the  festivals  of  the 
Dionysia  and  the  Thargelia.  Finally,  there  was  the 
ephebic  military  training  furnished  by  the  government. 

How  general  was  education  in  Athens?  Did  all  boys 
have  regular  schooling  and  for  how  long?  We  do  not 
know  with  certainty.  That  some  formal  education  was 
quite  general  is  evident  from  the  references  in  the  liter¬ 
ature  and  from  the  conspicuous  intelligence  of  the 
average  Athenian  citizen.  The  sons  of  the  rich  natu¬ 
rally  started  to  school  earlier  and  remained  longer  than 
those  of  the  less  well-to-do.  Advanced  education,  even 
the  secondary  education  offered  to  boys  over  fourteen, 
could  be  afforded  by  the  more  prosperous  only.  But 
there  were  schools  of  all  classes  and  tuition  fees  were 
very  small  in  certain  elementary  schools.  Athens  her¬ 
self  was  a  great  school  of  boundless  opportunity  and 
rich  and  poor  alike  constantly  were  being  educated  in 
the  Assembly,  the  Senate,  the  theater,  the  court-room, 
and  the  agora.  Nor  should  the  fact  be  overlooked  that 
in  the  fourth  century  b.c.  Athenian  youths  of  the  age 
of  eighteen  were  drafted  for  military  training  of  two 
years'  duration,  an  education  in  itself  primarily  physical 


154  GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 

and  military,  yet  to  this  gradually  was  added  mental 
discipline. 

Little  children  were  taught  at  home  by  their  parents 
or  by  nurse  and  paedagogus,  their  attendant  slave.  At 
six  or  seven  the  boys  were  sent  to  primary  school,  usu¬ 
ally  to  a  school  of  the  neighborhood.  Girls  were  taught 
exclusively  at  home  by  their  mothers  and  did  not  re¬ 
ceive  the  formal  training  given  their  brothers.  The 
elementary  school-teachers  were  men;  as  a  rule  they 
were  not  persons  of  much  education  and  their  social 
standing  was  insignificant.  They  gained  a  meager 
livelihood  from  the  tuition  fees  paid  monthly  by  the 
parents.  The  amount  of  the  fee  and  the  course  of 
study  were  determined  by  the  teacher.  The  daily 
session  began  early  in  the  morning  and  continued  in 
the  afternoon  after  the  boys  had  returned  from  lunch¬ 
eon.  Holidays  were  numerous  and  in  some  months,  as, 
for  example,  Anthesterion  (February— March),  the 
school  sessions  were  much  broken.  Theophrastus  tells 
us  of  a  stingy  parent  who  regularly  kept  his  children 
out  of  school  during  this  month,  thereby  saving  the  tui¬ 
tion  fee!  In  the  school-room  the  boys  sat  on  plain 
benches,  while  the  master  enjoyed  an  arm-chair,  or 
cathedra .  Vase-paintings  show  us  writing-tablets, 
rulers,  and  baskets  full  of  rolls  of  manuscripts  hung  on 
the  walls  and,  in  the  music-school,  lyres  and  flutes. 

Athenian  education  comprised  music  and  gymnastic. 
By  music  in  the  broad  sense,  the  Greeks  meant  that 
training  of  the  mind  and  character  in  any  art  presided 
over  by  a  Muse.  In  the  elementary  school,  music  in¬ 
cluded  reading,  writing,  the  learning  of  poetry,  count¬ 
ing,  singing,  and  playing  on  the  lyre,  and,  for  a  period 
after  the  Persian  Wars,  on  the  flute.  In  the  better  and 
larger  schools  reading,  writing,  and  arithmetic  would 
be  taught  by  a  special  teacher,  called  the  grammatistes , 
instruction  in  music  and  poetry  was  given  by  the 
harpist,  the  kitharistes,  while  physical  training  was  di¬ 
rected  by  the  trainer,  the  paidotribes.  Formal  primary 
education  occupied  the  Athenian  boy  roughly  from  the 


ATHENIAN  EDUCATION 


155 


age  of  six  until  fourteen;  secondary,  largely  for  the 
prosperous,  from  fourteen  until  eighteen;  and  the 
ephebic  military  training  from  eighteen  to  twenty.  The 
elements  of  reading,  writing,  arithmetic  and  music 
naturally  comprised  the  primary  schooling ;  in  the 
secondary  period,  literature,  grammar,  rhetoric,  draw¬ 
ing,  and  geometry  were  added  as  advanced  courses. 
Higher  instruction,  roughly  comparable  with  a  modern 
college  course,  was  attainable  by  young  men  whose 
means,  time,  and  interests  permitted.  This  training 
might  be  in  philosophy,  under  the  direction  of  philoso¬ 
phers,  or  in  rhetoric  and  oratory,  under  the  tuition  of 
popular  teachers,  the  Sophists. 

The  Athenian  school-boy  may  well  be  envied  by  the 
modern  youth  because  of  the  comparative  simplicity 
of  his  program  of  studies.  He  could  concentrate  upon 
the  Greek  language  and  literature  because  no  other 
v  language  was  studied.  Mathematical  studies  were 
simple  and  elementary.  Little  knowledge  of  the 
sciences  existed  in  the  fifth  and  fourth  centuries  b.c., 
at  any  rate  of  a  popular  kind.  The  basis  for  reading 
was  furnished  by  Homer,  Hesiod,  Theognis  and  the 
lyric  poets  and  probably,  towards  the  end  of  the  fifth 
century,  the  tragedians.  Especially  emphasized  was  the 
study  of  the  Homeric  poems,  which  were  the  very 
backbone  of  the  school  course.  Fine  passages  were  in¬ 
timately  studied  and  many  books  were  even  learned  by 
heart.  Books  and  materials  were  expensive,  hence 
dictation  by  the  master  and  copying  and  memorizing 
by  the  pupil  were  largely  employed.  This  method  en¬ 
couraged  wide  knowledge  of  the  poets  and  also  explains 
the  remarkable  memories  of  the  Greeks. 

It  is  difficult,  but  vitally  important,  for  the  student 
of  Greek  education  and  literature  ever  to  keep  in  mind 
that  reading,  to  the  Greeks,  meant  not  silent  perusal  of 
a  text,  but  always  reading  aloud.  Enunciation  and 
clearness  of  expression  were  essential,  and  voice  train¬ 
ing  was  constant.  The  method  of  instruction  was 
largely  oral,  by  dictation,  as  has  been  said,  and  in  the 


156 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


class-room  recitation  of  lessons,  and  not  writing,  was  - 
the  rule.  Books  were  not  generally  owned  because  of 
their  expense,  and  the  spoken,  not  the  written,  word 
characterized  and  profoundly  influenced  every  form  of 
intellectual  activity.  If  this  fact  is  constantly  remem¬ 
bered,  it  is  much  easier  to  understand  the  prominence  in 
the  ancient  world  of  oratory  and  speaking,  of  the 
drama,  of  recitation,  of  the  public  recitals  and  contests, 
and  of  the  influence  and  popularity  of  the  Sophists. 

Writing  was  practiced  on  tablets  of  wax  with  a 
pointed  instrument.  Papyrus  gradually  came  into  use 
for  more  permanent  records,  the  writing  being  done 
with  a  reed  pen  and  ink.  The  poet  was  regarded  by 
the  Athenians  as  primarily  a  teacher  rather  than  a 
literary  artist.  While  pupils  were  taught  to  observe 
and  to  admire  literary  excellence  and  diction,  and  form 
and  beauty  in  verse,  yet  the  moral  teaching  in  the  poet 
was  stressed  by  the  instructor,  and  influence  on  char¬ 
acter  was  regarded  as  the  summum  bonum.  The  poet 
is  to  be  admired,  says  Aristophanes,  insofar  as  he 
makes  men  better  and  makes  them  better  citizens.  In 
the  comedy,  the  Frogs ,  Aeschylus  is  rebuking  Euripides 
for  the  evil  conduct  of  some  of  his  heroes  and  heroines. 
Euripides  retorts:  “But  is  it  not  true,  this  evil  which 
I  have  depicted?  Is  there  not  evil  and  are  there  not 
bad  people  in  the  world?5’  Aeschylus  answers:  “  Cer¬ 
tainly,  but  it  is  the  duty  of  the  poet  to  conceal  this 
evil  and  not  to  parade  it  and  teach  it.  Everyone  who 
talks  at  all  is  a  teacher  to  little  children,  but  poets  are 
the  teachers  to  the  young.  It  is  therefore  the  duty  of  us 
poets  to  speak  only  the  Good.”  This  passage  is  of  par¬ 
ticular  interest  to  us  at  present,  when  there  is  so  much 
discussion  relative  to  realism  on  the  stage  and  in  litera¬ 
ture  and  of  the  need  or  the  possibility  of  censorship. 
Just  before  these  lines  from  the  Frogs  Aeschylus  had 
claimed  for  his  plays  that  they  were  esentially  moral, 
and  inspired  in  the  reader  or  the  auditor  conduct  of  a 
like  kind.  For  example,  the  Seven  against  Thebes  had 
made  the  Athenians  more  martial  and  braver.  This 


ATHENIAN  EDUCATION 


157 


was  the  effect,  too,  of  the  teaching  of  the  Persians. 
Aeschylus  (i.e.,  Aristophanes)  says  that  poets  should 
train  men:  “  The  great  poets  have  been  great  teachers, 
as  Orpheus,  who  taught  religious  mysteries;  Musaeus 
taught  healing  of  diseases  and  oracles  and  Hesiod  agri¬ 
culture,  while  the  great  Homer  himself  inculcated  brav¬ 
ery  and  gave  instruction  in  the  marshalling  and  arming 
of  men.” 

In  the  Clouds ,  also,  Aristophanes  has  something  to 
say  on  education.  In  his  usual  role  of  the  laudator 
temporis  acti ,  the  comic  poet  compares  the  old  system 
of  education  with  the  new,  much  to  the  disadvantage 
of  the  latter:  “  In  the  ancient  system  of  education  it 
was  incumbent  that  no  one  should  hear  the  voice  of  a 
boy  uttering  a  syllable;  and  next,  that  those  from  the 
same  quarter  of  the  town  should  march  in  good  order 
through  the  streets  to  the  school  of  the  Harpmaster, 
lightly  clad  and  in  a  body,  even  if  it  were  to  snow  as 
thick  as  meal.  Then  the  master  would  teach  them  — 
the  boys  not  sitting  cross-legged  —  to  learn  by  heart  a 
song  —  either  the  Pallas ,  or  Loud  Strain  of  the  Lyre 
—  raising  high  their  voices  in  the  strain  our  fathers 
handed  down  to  us.  But  if  any  one  of  them  should 
play  the  buffoon  or  start  any  of  those  flourishes,  such 
as  musicians  nowadays  affect,  those  intricate  flourishes 
a  la  Phrynis,  he  got  well-drubbed,  being  beaten  with 
many  stripes  for  spoiling  good  music.  Nor  was  it 
formerly  allowed,  when  a  boy  was  dining,  to  take 
even  the  head  of  a  radish,  or  to  snatch  from  his  seniors 
dill  or  parsley,  or  to  eat  fish,  or  to  giggle,  or  to  keep 
the  legs  crossed.” 

The  moral  results  of  the  good  old  instruction  are 
further  humorously  stressed  as  a  discipline  “  which 
produced  the  heroes  of  Marathon,  and  taught  youths 
to  hate  the  market-place,  to  keep  away  from  the  hot 
baths,  to  blush  at  things  that  are  shameful,  to  give  up 
their  seats  to  their  elders,  to  be  respectful  to  their 
parents,  to  refrain  from  running  after  chorus-girls, 
not  to  Talk  back  ’  to  a  father,  e.g.,  calling  him  an  old 


158 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


fogy.  If  a  youth  today  choose  the  former  good 
schooling,  he  will  pass  the  time  in  the  wrestling-schools 
healthy  and  blooming,  not  chattering  in  the  market¬ 
place;  he  will  go  down  to  the  Academy  to  run  with 
well-behaved  comrades  ’neath  the  olive  trees  with  a 
garland  of  light  reed  upon  his  brow,  and  fragrant  with 
iris,  and  heartsease  and  silver  poplar,  rejoicing  in  the 
season  of  springtime,  what  time  the  plane-tree  whis¬ 
pers  to  the  elm.” 

A  passage  of  interest  to  the  student  of  Athenian 
education  is  found  in  the  Protagoras  (325  C)  of  Plato: 

“  Education  and  admonition  commence  in  the  first 
years  of  childhood,  and  last  to  the  very  end  of  life. 
Mother  and  nurse  and  father  and  tutor  are  vying  with 
one  another  about  the  improvement  of  the  child  as 
soon  as  ever  he  is  able  to  understand  what  is  being 
said  to  him:  he  cannot  say  or  do  anything  without 
their  setting  forth  to  him  that  this  is  just  and  that  is 
unjust;  this  is  honourable,  that  is  dishonourable;  this 
is  holy,  that  is  unholy;  do  this  and  abstain  from  that, 
and  if  he  obeys,  well  and  good;  if  not,  he  is  straight¬ 
ened  by  threats  and  blows,  like  a  piece  of  bent  or 
warped  wood.  At  a  later  stage  they  send  him  to 
teachers,  and  enjoin  them  to  see  to  his  manners  even 
more  than  to  his  reading  and  music;  and  the  teachers 
do  as  they  are  desired.  And  when  the  boy  has 
learned  his  letters  and  is  beginning  to  understand  what 
is  written,  as  before  he  understood  only  what  was 
spoken,  they  put  into  his  hands  the  works  of  great 
poets,  which  he  reads  sitting  on  a  bench  at  school;  in 
these  are  contained  many  admonitions  and  many  tales, 
and  praises,  and  encomia  of  ancient  famous  men  which 
he  is  required  to  learn  by  heart,  in  order  that  he  may 
imitate  or  emulate  them  and  desire  to  become  like 
them.  Then,  again,  the  teachers  of  the  lyre  take 
similar  care  that  their  young  disciple  is  temperate  and 
gets  into  no  mischief,  and  when  they  have  taught  him 
the  use  of  the  lyre,  they  introduce  him  to  the  poems 


t 


ATHENIAN  EDUCATION 


159 


of  other  excellent  poets,  who  are  the  lyric  poets;  and 
these  they  set  to  music,  and  make  their  harmonies  and 
rhythms  quite  familiar  to  the  children’s  souls,  in  order 
that  they  may  learn  to  be  more  gentle,  and  harmoni¬ 
ous,  and  rhythmical,  and  so  more  fitted  to  speech  and 
action;  for  the  life  of  man  in  every  part  has  need  of 
harmony  and  rhythm.  Then  they  send  them  to  the 
master  of  gymnastic,  in  order  that  their  bodies  may 
better  minister  to  the  virtuous  mind,  and  that  they 
may  not  be  compelled  through  bodily  weakness  to 
play  the  coward  in  war  or  on  any  other  occasion  ” 
(Trans,  by  Jowett). 

Plato  gives  us  in  the  above  passage  an  admirable 
account  of  the  old  Athenian  early  education.  Virtue, 
he  believed,  is  teachable.  Other  passages  in  Plato  of 
interest  and  value  might  be  quoted,  particularly  from 
the  Republic,  as  for  example,  in  Book  II  (376ft),  and 
from  the  Laws;  Aristotle’s  Politics  should  also  be  con¬ 
sulted. 

The  two  great  branches  of  higher  education  at 
Athens,  which  developed  toward  the  end  of  the  fifth 
century  b.c.  and  flourished  exceedingly  in  the  fourth 
century  and  thereafter,  were  rhetoric  and  philosophy. 
They  were  rival  studies  and  each  was  claimed  by  its 
teachers  to  be  of  greater  value  than  the  other  as  an 
instrument  of  education  to  fit  the  young  men  of  the 
day  for  all  duties  and  activities  of  life. 

Rhetoric  first  claims  our  attention  as  taught  by  the 
Sophists.  The  word  rhetoric  in  the  Greek  sense  is  of 
much  wider  connotation  than  in  English.  It  meant, 
first  of  all,  the  art  of  persuasion  by  speaking.  More 
than  oratory,  it  had  as  its  aim  the  moving  of  men  in 
public  matters.  The  word  Sophistes  in  Greek  was  ap¬ 
plied  at  an  early  time  to  one  who  was  regarded  as 
possessing  wisdom.  Originally  it  was  a  term  of  re¬ 
spect.  Thus  Homer,  Hesiod,  and  the  lyric  poets  are 
called  sophistai .  The  Seven  Wise  Men  — Thales, 
Solon,  Pittacus,  etc.,  —  were  also  designated  by  this 


160 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


term.  In  the  latter  part  of  the  fifth  century  the 
changing  political  and  social  conditions  at  Athens  pro¬ 
foundly  stimulated  intellectual  activity  and  inquiry. 
Curiosity  was  rife  concerning  questions  of  every  sort 
and  great  interest  was  evoked  in  such  fields  as  ethics, 
government,  history,  grammar,  religion,  mathematics, 
and  the  sciences.  Foremost,  however,  was  the  interest 
in  public  speaking  and  the  art  of  persuasion.  In  the 
democracy  every  citizen  had  a  chance  to  influence  his 
reflows,  to  gain  position  and  power,  and  to  win  repu¬ 
tation  by  public  speaking  in  Assembly  or  in  Senate. 
In  fact,  it  was  even  obligatory  that  every  participant 
in  a  law-suit  plead  his  own  case.  There  was  inevi¬ 
tably  a  demand  by  youths  of  mature  years  for  a  more 
advanced  education  than  was  afforded  by  the  com¬ 
paratively  elementary  training  of  the  schools.  A  veri¬ 
table  crop  of  teachers  arose  to  satisfy  this  demand. 
These  teachers,  lecturers,  and  professors  came  from  all 
over  the  Greek  world  —  from  Ionia,  and  from  Thrace, 
from  Sicily,  and,  of  course,  from  Athens  itself.  The 
teachers  from  Sicily  and  Magna  Graecia  were  espe¬ 
cially  interested  in  rhetoric  proper,  whereas  those  from 
Ionia  embraced  a  much  wider  field,  encyclopaedic  in 
scope,  stressing  grammar  and  literary  criticism  with 
dialectic  as  a  basis.  Many  of  these  men  became  im¬ 
mensely  popular  and  their  lectures  were  attended  by 
throngs  of  youths  who  paid  large  tuition  fees  for  the 
privilege.  Some  of  the  Sophists  were  itinerant  lec¬ 
turers,  traveling  about  and  teaching  in  various  parts 
of  the  Greek  world;  others  established  flourishing 
schools  in  Athens.  Certain  of  these  teachers  were 
persons  of  superior  attainments,  excellent  and  sincere 
men,  who  had  at  heart  the  welfare  of  their  students. 
Ethical  training  formed  the  basis  of  their  instruction. 
Their  fees  were  honestly  earned  in  an  effort  to  ground 
their  pupils  in  the  thorough  knowledge  and  effective 
use  of  the  Greek  language  and  literature.  They  tried 
not  merely  to  give  information  in  various  fields  of 
knowledge,  but  sought  also  to  train  their  disciples  in 


ATHENIAN  EDUCATION 


161 


thinking,  and  in  the  exercise  of  judgment  and  the  use 
of  imagination.  Readiness  of  thought,  wide  informa¬ 
tion  on  many  topics,  and  ability  to  speak,  especially 
extemporaneously,  were  cardinal  features  of  their 
pedagogical  system.  But  it  is  not  surprising  that  amid 
the  restless  conditions  which  then  obtained,  when  the 
old  standards  of  conduct  and  thought  were  being  swept 
away  and  a  new  world  was  being  ushered  in,  that 
charlatans  appeared  who  sought  and  found  a  rich  field 
for  harvest.  The  road  to  popularity  and  to  affluence 
lay  open  to  many  men  who  were  able  to  attract  atten¬ 
tion  by  skilful  advertising,  personal  magnetism  and 
extravagant  claims.  These  dishonest  and  insincere 
professors  of  the  new  education,  with  their  much  ad¬ 
vertised  short  cuts  to  knowledge,  filled  their  lecture 
rooms  with  hearers,  and  their  purses  with  money. 
At  the  same  time,  however,  they  brought  disrepute 
upon  themselves  from  the  discriminating,  and  by  the 
fourth  century  b,c.  had  fastened  upon  the  term 
sophistes  an  invidious  meaning  which  survives  to  the 
present  day  in  its  English  derivatives,  sophist ,  sophis¬ 
try ,  and  sophism. 

Who  were  some  of  the  famous  men  who  played  at 
Athens  prominent  roles  as  influential  teachers  in  this 
great  educational  movement?  Socrates  himself  is 
really  an  example  of  the  Sophist  in  the  best  sense. 
He  was  at  variance  with  the  professional  Sophists, 
however,  in  that  his  teaching  was  ever  informal,  he 
charged  no  fees,  and  he  made  no  claims  to  superior 
knowledge  —  in  fact,  with  characteristic  irony  he 
always  asserted  his  ignorance  —  but  the  spirit  of  the 
age  inspired  him  to  devote  his  life  to  instructing  his 
fellow-citizens  in  the  field  of  ethics,  and  aroused  him 
to  combat  popular  misconceptions  and  hence  to  dis¬ 
credit  the  vain  assumptions  of  the  Sophists  of  the 
baser  type.  The  Socratic  ideal  of  education  was  this, 
that  it  should  prepare  the  individual  for  living,  and 
that  it  should  train  and  fit  him  for  leadership  in  the 
State.  In  spite  of  Socrates’  sterling  integrity  and 


162 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


absolute  honesty  it  was  his  misfortune  to  be  confused 
with  the  charlatans  and  actually  to  suffer  martyrdom, 
being  convicted  through  popular  prejudice  and  cal¬ 
umny  on  the  charge  of  corrupting  the  youth! 

Especially  prominent  representatives  of  the  New 
Education  as  Professors  of  Practical  Culture  were 
Protagoras,  Prodicus,  Hippias,  Gorgias,  Isocrates,  and 
Alcidamas.  Protagoras  of  Abdera,  who  gives  his 
name  to  Plato’s  well-known  dialogue,  enjoyed  great 
repute  and  apparently  deservedly  so.  He  was  the  first 
of  the  Sophists  proper,  and  for  forty  years  traveled 
and  taught  throughout  Greece  receiving,  we  are  told, 
for  a  course  of  lectures  some  $2000.  He  was  famous 
for  his  dialectic,  and  his  teaching  of  commonplaces 
for  use  in  speaking  by  means  of  which  his  students 
were  able  “  to  make  the  weaker  argument  appear  the 
stronger.”  His  best  known  utterance  is  that  “  Man  is 
the  measure  of  all  things.”  He  was  interested,  too, 
in  logic  and  grammar.  Protagoras  claimed  to  make 
his  pupils  better  and  wiser  men  by  “  teaching  them 
prudence  in  affairs  private  and  public;  in  short,  the 
science  or  knowledge  of  human  life.” 

Prodicus  of  Ceos,  somewhat  younger  than  Protag¬ 
oras,  was  especially  concerned  with  synonyms  and  the 
exact  meaning  of  words.  He  taught  morals  and  rhe¬ 
torical  style  and  achieved  reputation  and  considerable 
wealth. 

Hippias  of  Elis  boasted  an  encyclopaedic  culture 
and  professed  to  teach  economics,  ethics,  and  politics; 
“  the  faculty  of  managing  public  affairs  along  with 
one’s  own.” 

We  come  now  to  Gorgias  of  Leontini  in  Sicily,  who 
is  a  striking  and  extremely  important  figure  in  the 
history  of  rhetoric  and  education,  a  teacher  and  orator 
who  made  a  profound  and  lasting  impression  on  the 
theory  and  the  practice  of  rhetoric.  His  chief  con¬ 
cern  was  with  style  and  poetic  rhetorical  embellish¬ 
ment.  Not  the  message,  but  the  manner,  not  the 
thought,  but  the  expression  —  this  sums  up  his  belief 


. 


ATHENIAN  EDUCATION 


163 


and  practice.  Greek  prose  as  Gorgias  found  it  was 
stiff,  hard,  austere,  and  inartistic.  It  was  a  rather 
unwieldy  instrument,  as  for  centuries  verse  had  been 
the  only  means  of  literary  expression.  For  this  reason 
even  the  early  philosophers  wrote  in  verse  rather  than 
in  prose.  Gorgias  conceived  the  idea  of  marrying  to 
prose  the  polish,  the  finish,  and  the  embellishments  of 
poetry.  Accordingly  he  sowed  figures  and  rhetorical 
devices  as  with  a  sack,  and  achieved  a  style  which  was 
characterized  by  a  plethora  of  words  and  a  paucity 
of  ideas.  These  figures  and  poetic  devices  are  antith¬ 
esis,  paronomasia,  alliteration,  repetition  of  words, 
likeness  of  sound  in  final  syllables  of  successive  words 
and  clauses,  and  arrangement  of  words  in  nearly  equal 
periods.  Added  to  these  are  alternating  amplifica¬ 
tion  and  brevity,  bold  metaphors,  unusual  epithets, 
and  poetic  rhythm.  In  427  b.c.  Gorgias  came  to 
Athens  as  the  head  of  a  Sicilian  embassy  and  addressed 
the  Assembly.  The  effect  of  his  speech  was  electri¬ 
fying,  as  the  younger  men  were  swept  away  by  the 
brilliancy,  eloquence,  and  the  unwonted  style  of  his 
oration. 

These  stylistic  characteristics  —  seen  later  in  the 
Asiatic  school  of  Greek  oratory  and  in  Euphuism  in 
English  literature  —  which  impress  us  as  inartistic  and 
frigid  in  the  extreme,  met  with  high  praise  and  imi¬ 
tation,  or  with  strong  censure  and  avoidance,  in  his 
own  and  subsequent  generations.  The  Gorgian  in¬ 
fluence  was  beneficial  insofar  as  it  gave  greater  polish, 
smoothness,  and  flexibility  to  the  Attic  prose  of  Anti¬ 
phon,  Thucydides,  Isocrates,  and  their  successors. 
His  influence  was  pernicious,  when  he  was  followed 
slavishly  to  excess.  But  Gorgias’  great  contribution 
to  Greece  was  this:  he  was  the  founder  of  artistic 
prose,  and  with  him  begins  epideictic  literature,  or  the 
rhetoric  of  display.  Of  the  writings  of  Gorgias  we 
possess  a  fragment  of  a  Funeral  Oration ,  and  a  dis¬ 
course  The  Encomium  on  Helen  which  most  scholars 


164 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


believe  genuine.  The  latter  composition  deserves  our 
further  consideration. 

In  the  centuries  succeeding  Homer  we  find  in  Greek 
literature  numerous  disparaging  animadversions  on 
Helen  of  Sparta  and  Troy.  The  praise  of  Helen, 
however,  became  a  favorite  theme  with  the  rheto¬ 
ricians,  since  the  difficulty  of  a  vindication  was  a  con¬ 
stant  challenge  to  their  rhetorical  skill  and  ingenuity. 
The  Encomium  on  Helen  of  Gorgias  is  a  short  but 
astounding  composition,  in  which  the  master  of  poetic 
and  figurative  prose  fairly  outdid  himself.  In  justice 
to  the  author  it  must  be  remembered  that  he  charac¬ 
terizes  his  effort  as  a  sportive  piece,  a  jeu  d’ esprit.  A 
translation  of  the  most  interesting  portions  of  the 
discourse  is  given  below,  in  which  I  have  made  an 
effort  to  reproduce  in  the  English  as  faithfully  as  pos¬ 
sible  the  florid  and  frigid  Greek. 

“  Embellishment  to  a  city  is  the  valor  of  its  citizens; 
to  a  person,  comeliness;  to  a  soul,  wisdom;  to  a  deed, 
virtue;  to  discourse,  truth.  But  the  opposite  to  these 
is  lack  of  embellishment.  Now  a  man,  woman,  dis¬ 
course,  work,  city,  deed,  if  deserving  of  praise,  must 
be  honored  with  praise,  but  if  undeserving  must  be 
censured.  For  it  is  alike  aberration  and  stultification 
to  censure  the  commendable  and  commend  the  cen¬ 
surable. 

“It  is  the  duty  of  the  same  individual  both  to  pro¬ 
claim  justice  wholly,  and  to  declaim  against  injustice 
holily,  to  confute  the  detractors  of  Helen,  a  woman 
concerning  whom  there  has  been  uniform  and  universal 
praise  of  poets  and  the  celebration  of  her  name  has 
been  the  commemoration  of  her  fame.  But  I  desire 
by  rational  calculation  to  free  the  lady’s  reputation, 
by  disclosing  her  detractors  as  prevaricators,  and,  by 
revealing  the  truth,  to  put  an  end  to  error. 

“  That  in  nature  and  nurture  the  lady  was  the  fairest 
flower  of  men  and  women  is  not  unknown,  not  even 
to  the  few,  for  her  maternity  was  of  Leda,  her  pater- 


ATHENIAN  EDUCATION 


165 


nity  immortal  by  generation,  but  mortal  by  reputation, 
Tyndareus  and  Zeus,  of  whom  the  one  was  reputed  in 
the  being,  the  other  was  asserted  in  the  affirming;  the 
former,  the  greatest  of  humanity,  the  latter,  the  lord¬ 
liest  of  divinity.  Of  such  origin  she  was  endowed  with 
godlike  beauty,  expressed  not  suppressed,  which 
inspired  in  many  men  many  mad  moods  of  love,  and 
she,  one  lovely  person,  assembled  many  personalities 
of  proud  ambition,  of  whom  some  possessed  opulent 
riches,  others  the  fair  fame  of  ancient  ancestry;  others 
the  vigor  of  native  strength,  others  the  power  of 
acquired  wisdom;  and  all  came  because  of  amorous 
contention  and  ambitious  pretention. 

“Who  he  was,  however,  who  won  Helen  and  attained 
his  heart’s  desire,  and  why,  and  how,  I  will  not  say, 
since  to  give  information  to  the  informed  conduces 
to  confirmation,  but  conveys  no  delectation.  Passing 
over  in  my  present  discourse  the  time  now  past,  I  will 
proceed  to  the  beginning  of  my  intended  discussion 
and  will  predicate  the  causes  by  reason  of  which  it 
was  natural  that  Helen  went  to  Troy.  For  either  by 
the  disposition  of  fortune  and  the  ratification  of  the 
gods  and  the  determination  of  necessity  she  did  what 
she  did,  or  by  violence  confounded,  or  by  persuasion 
dumbfounded,  or  to  Love  surrendered.  If,  however, 
it  was  against  her  will,  the  culpable  should  not  be 
exculpated.  For  it  is  impossible  to  forestall  divine 
disposals  by  human  proposals.  It  is  a  law  of  nature 
that  the  stronger  is  not  subordinated  to  the  weaker, 
but  the  weaker  is  subjugated  and  dominated  by  the 
stronger;  the  stronger  is  the  leader,  while  the  weaker 
is  the  entreater.  Divinity  surpasses  humanity  in 
might,  in  sight,  and  in  all  else.  Therefore,  if  on  for¬ 
tune  and  the  deity  we  must  visit  condemnation,  the 
infamy  of  Helen  should  find  no  confirmation. 

“  But  if  by  violence  she  was  defeated  and  unlawfully 
she  was  treated  and  to  her  injustice  was  meted,  clearly 
her  violator  as  a  terrifier  was  importunate,  while  she, 
translated  and  violated,  was  unfortunate.  Therefore, 


166 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


the  barbarian  who  verbally,  legally,  actually  attempted 
the  barbarous  attempt,  should  meet  with  verbal  accu¬ 
sation,  legal  reprobation,  and  actual  condemnation. 
For  Helen,  who  was  violated,  and  from  her  fatherland 
separated,  and  from  her  friends  segregated,  should 
justly  meet  with  commiseration  rather  than  with 
defamation.  For  he  was  the  victor  and  she  was  the 
victim.  It  is  just,  therefore,  to  sympathize  with  the 
latter  and  anathematize  the  former. 

“  But  if  it  was  through  persuasion’s  reception  and  the 
soul’s  deception  it  is  not  difficult  to  defend  the  situa¬ 
tion  and  forefend  the  accusation,  thus.  Persuasion 
is  a  powerful  potentate,  who  with  frailest,  feeblest 
frame  works  wonders.  For  it  can  put  an  end  to  fear 
and  make  vexation  vanish;  it  can  inspire  exultation 
and  increase  compassion.  I  will  show  how  this  is  so. 
For  I  must  indicate  this  to  my  hearers  for  them  to 
predicate.  All  poetry  I  ordain  and  proclaim  to  be 
composition  in  meter,  the  listeners  of  which  are 
affected  by  passionate  trepidation  and  compassionate 
perturbation  and  likewise  tearful  lamentation,  since 
through  discourse  the  soul  suffers,  as  if  its  own,  the 
felicity  and  infelicity  of  property  and  person  of  others. 

“  Come,  let  us  turn  to  another  consideration.  In¬ 
spired  incantations  are  provocative  of  charm  and  revo¬ 
cative  of  harm.  For  the  power  of  song  in  association 
with  the  belief  of  the  soul  captures  and  enraptures 
and  translates  the  soul  with  witchery.  For  there  have 
been  discovered  arts  twain  of  witchery  and  sorcery, 
which  are  consternation  to  the  heart  and  perturbation 
to  art. 

“  Now,  it  has  been  shown  that,  if  Helen  was  won 
over  by  persuasion,  she  is  deserving  of  commiseration, 
and  not  condemnation.  The  fourth  accusation  I  shall 
now  proceed  to  answer  with  a  fourth  refutation.  For 
if  love  was  the  doer  of  all  these  deeds,  with  no  diffi¬ 
culty  will  she  be  acquitted  of  the  crime  attributed  to 
her.  The  nature  of  that  which  we  see  is  not  that 
which  we  wish  it  to  be,  but  as  it  chances  to  be.  For 


ATHENIAN  EDUCATION  167 

through  the  vision  the  soul  is  also  in  various  ways 
smitten. 

“  If,  then,  the  eye  of  Helen  charmed  by  Alexander’s 
beauty,  gave  to  her  soul  excitement  and  amorous 
incitement,  what  wonder?  How  could  one  who  was 
weaker,  repel  and  expel  him  who,  being  divine,  had 
power  divine?  If  it  was  physical  diversion  and 
psychical  perversion,  we  should  not  execrate  it  as  repre¬ 
hensible,  but  deprecate  it  as  indefensible.  For  it  came 
to  whom  it  came  by  fortuitous  insinuations,  not  by 
judicious  resolutions;  by  erotic  compulsions,  not  by 
despotic  machinations.  How,  then,  is  it  fair  to  blame 
Helen  who,  whether  by  love  captivated,  or  by  word  . 
persuaded,  or  by  violence  dominated,  or  by  divine 
necessity  subjugated,  did  what  she  did,  and  is  com¬ 
pletely  absolved  from  blame? 

“  By  this  discourse  I  have  freed  a  woman  from  evil 
reputation;  I  have  kept  the  promise  which  I  made  in 
the  beginning;  I  have  essayed  to  dispose  of  the  in¬ 
justice  of  defamation  and  the  folly  of  allegation;  I 
have  prayed  to  compose  a  lucubration  for  Helen’s 
adulation  and  my  own  delectation.” 

The  greatest  of  the  permanent  teachers  of  rhetoric 
in  Athens  was  Isocrates,  who  was  born  in  Attica  in 
436  b.c.  and  lived  to  the  great  age  of  98  years.  He 
was  a  pupil  of  the  greatest  teachers  of  his  time, 
namely,  Protagoras,  Prodicus,  and  Gorgias,  and  was 
influenced  by  Socrates. 

Early  in  life  he  was  by  profession  a  logographos  or 
writer  of  speeches  for  participants  in  law-suits,  until, 
about  390  B.C-,  he  opened  a  school  of  rhetoric.  For 
fifty  years  his  school  was  an  influential  educational 
center  and  was  attended  by  ambitious  young  men  from 
all  parts  of  the  Greek  world,  even  from  Pontus,  Sicily, 
and  Cyprus,  and  many  of  these  subsequently  dis¬ 
tinguished  themselves.  Among  these  pupils  were  the 
orators  Isaeus,  Lycurgus,  and  Hyperides,  the  historians 
Ephorus  and  Theopompus,  and  the  statesman  Timo- 


168 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


theus.  The  course  of  study  occupied  three  to  four 
years  and  the  tuition  fee  charged  for  the  whole  course 
was  a  thousand  drachmas,  about  $180.  Isocrates  pro¬ 
fessed  to  train  young  men  for  public  life  through  the 
study  of  rhetoric  and  eloquence,  that  is,  oratory  in  the 
broadest  sense.  Now  this  study  he  taught  as  a 
“  philosophy,”  because  his  rhetorical  instruction 
formed,  he  claimed,  no  mere  orator  or  advocate,  but 
trained  the  taste,  judgment,  and  character.  In  short,  he 
professed  to  conduct  a  school  of  morals.  His  definition 
of  an  educated  man,  as  given  in  his  Panathenaic  dis¬ 
course  (3off),  is  interesting,  and  is  even  more  perti¬ 
nent  and  worthy  of  reflection  than  when  it  was  formu¬ 
lated.  Particularly  challenging  is  the  first  sentence: 

“  Whom,  then,  do  I  call  educated,  since  I  refuse  this 
name  to  those  who  have  learned  only  certain  trades, 
or  certain  sciences,  or  have  had  only  certain  faculties 
developed?  First,  those  who  manage  well  the  daily 
affairs  of  life  as  they  arise,  and  whose  judgment  is 
accurate  and  rarely  errs  when  aiming  at  the  expedient. 
Then,  those  who  associate  in  dignified  and  honorable 
fashion  with  all  with  whom  they  come  in  contact,  bear¬ 
ing  easily  and  good-naturedly  what  is  unpleasant  or  of¬ 
fensive  in  others,  and  softening,  as  much  as  possible, 
their  own  asperities  of  manner.  Further,  those  who 
never  become  the  slaves  of  pleasure,  and  who  by  mis¬ 
fortunes  are  not  unduly  cast  down  —  bearing  them¬ 
selves  in  their  presence  manfully  and  in  a  manner 
worthy  of  our  common  nature.  Fourthly,  and  most  im¬ 
portant  of  all,  those  who  are  uncorrupted  by  good  for¬ 
tune  and  do  not  lose  their  heads  and  become  arrogant, 
but,  retaining  control  of  themselves  as  intelligent  beings, 
rejoice  not  less  in  the  good  they  have  acquired  at  birth 
by  their  own  nature  and  intelligence  than  in  the  bene¬ 
fits  that  have  been  cast  in  their  way  by  chance.  Those 
whose  souls  are  in  permanent  and  harmonious  accord, 
not  with  one  of  these  things,  but  with  all  of  them, 
these,  I  say,  are  wise  and  perfect  men,  possessed  of 
all  the  virtues.  This  is  my  opinion  with  regard  to 


ATHENIAN  EDUCATION 


169 


educated  men.”  (Translation  from  Walden’s  Univer¬ 
sities  of  Ancient  Greece.) 

Isocrates’  school  ended  at  his  death,  but  the  influence 
of  the  man,  his  teaching,  and  his  writings,  has  been 
permanent.  In  his  own  day,  the  success  of  his  school, 
and  the  views  he  held  relative  to  education,  expounded 
chiefly  in  the  discourses  Against  the  Sophists  and  On 
the  Antidosis,  which  he  expressed  with  the  utmost 
vigor  and  indeed  with  condescending  and  patronizing 
frankness,  involved  him  in  keen  rivalries  and  disputes. 
The  greatest  of  his  rivals  was  the  Sophist  Alcidamas, 
the  successor  to  Gorgias. 

Alcidamas  devoted  his  talents  to  practical  oratory. 
Isocrates  held  that  if  a  student  had  natural  ability, 
then  discipline  and  practice  would  bring  success. 
Training  in  written  composition  on  worthy  themes 
was  emphasized.  Alcidamas,  on  the  contrary,  con¬ 
temned  and  belittled  the  written  word  and  lauded 
extemporaneous  speech  and  vigorously  argued  his 
case  in  an  extant  composition,  On  the  Sophists  or  On 
the  Writers  of  Written  Discourses. 

The  second  great  branch  of  Athenian  higher  educa¬ 
tion  was  the  study  of  philosophy.  After  the  death  of 
Socrates  there  arose  four  great  schools  in  Athens,  some¬ 
what  comparable  with  our  colleges:  the  Academic, 
founded  by  Plato;  the  Peripatetic,  originated  by 
Aristotle;  the  Stoic,  founded  by  Zeno;  and  the  Epi¬ 
curean,  the  school  of  Epicurus.  The  doctrines  of 
these  schools  are  discussed  in  the  chapter  devoted  to 
Greek  Philosophy.  At  the  death  of  Plato,  in  347  b.c., 
his  house,  which  was  located  near  the  grove  of  the 
Academy,  was  inherited,  together  with  its  contents,  by 
his  nephew  Speusippus  and  his  successors,  and  became 
a  permanent  school  with  an  appointed  or  elected  Head, 
called  the  Scholarch.  The  Peripatetic  School  was  held 
in  trust  as  a  college  by  Aristotle’s  successor,  Theo¬ 
phrastus,  and  his  followers.  The  Stoics  possessed  no 
private  property.  In  fact,  their  very  name  comes 


170 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


from  their  original  public  place  of  meeting,  the  Painted 
Stoa  (portico).  The  Epicurean  school  for  a  long 
period  occupied  the  house  and  garden  in  Athens  of 
its  founder,  Epicurus. 

It  remains  to  consider  briefly  a  form  of  education 
to  which  all  Athenian  youths  were  liable  —  the  mili¬ 
tary  ephebic  training.  Our  information  relative  to  the 
ephebes,  though  by  no  means  complete,  is  considerable 
and  is  gained  from  the  inscriptions.  The  Greek  word 
ephebe  (Fig.  42)  means  youth,  but  the  term  was  offi¬ 
cially  applied  to  young  men  of  Athens  of  citizen  status 
who  served  as  apprentices  in  arms  to  the  State  for  two 
years,  during  their  eighteenth  and  nineteenth  years. 
The  date  of  the  founding  of  the  College  of  the 
Ephebes  is  uncertain.  Such  military  service  had  been 
compulsory  to  a  certain  degree  in  the  fifth  century 
b.c.  Certainly  by  the  fourth  century  the  institution 
had  been  officially  established,  with  its  supervision 
placed  in  charge  of  the  generals  and  the  Court  of  the 
Areopagus,  and  with  numerous  instructors  who  were 
employed  by  the  State.  During  the  first  year  of 
service  the  cadet  was  trained  in  gymnastics,  the  use 
of  weapons,  riding  the  horse,  and  tactics.  In  the 
second  year,  he  had  patrol  and  guard  duties  and  serv¬ 
ice  in  the  Attic  forts.  The  Ephebes,  as  a  cavalry 
contingent,  found  place,  too,  in  festal  processions. 

The  oath,  sworn  to  by  all  the  Athenian  ephebes  on 
entering  service,  is  a  model  of  its  kind.  It  is  inscribed 
in  the  hall  of  the  Y.  M.  C.  A.  building  in  Chicago: 

“  I  will  never  disgrace  these  sacred  arms,  nor  desert 
my  companion  in  the  ranks.  I  will  fight  for  gods  and 
home,  both  alone  and  with  many.  I  will  transmit  my 
fatherland,  not  only  not  less,  but  greater  and  better, 
than  it  was  transmitted  to  me.  I  will  obey  the  magis¬ 
trates  who  may  at  any  time  be  in  power.  I  will  ob¬ 
serve  both  the  existing  laws  and  those  which  the  people 
may  unanimously  hereafter  make,  and,  if  any  person 


ATHENIAN  EDUCATION 


171 


seek  to  annul  the  laws  or  to  disobey  them,  I  will  do 
my  best  to  prevent  him,  and  will  defend  them  both 
alone  and  with  many.  I  will  honor  the  religion  of 
my  fathers.  And  I  call  to  witness  Agraulos  [daughter 
of  Cecrops],  Enyalios,  Ares,  Zeus,  Thallo  [daughter 
of  Zeus  and  Themis],  Auxo  and  Hegemone  [Graces].” 

Various  important  changes  in  the  ephebic  training 
and  service  took  place  during  the  fourth  and  third 
centuries.  Military  disciplines  were  relaxed  and  intel¬ 
lectual  studies  became  increasingly  important.  The 
ephebes  in  a  body,  led  by  their  Director,  attended 
lectures  in  philosophy  or  in  rhetoric  in  the  gymnasia. 
The  term  of  service  was  reduced  from  a  period  of  two 
years  to  one  year.  Attendance,  originally  compulsory, 
became,  after  the  Macedonian  conquest,  voluntary. 
Toward  the  end  of  the  second  century  b.c.  foreigners 
were  freely  admitted  to  the  college. 


CHAPTER  XII 


THE  GREEK  THEATER  AND  THE  PRODUCTION 

OF  PLAYS  \ 

“  In  a  romantic  wooded  dell  on  the  northeast  slope  of  Mt. 
Pentelicus,  a  short  half-day’s  journey  from  Athens,  lie  the  scanty 
remains  of  a  little  village  —  Icaria  —  which  should  be  the  Mecca 
of  all  lovers  of  the  drama,  for  it  is  the  legendary  birthplace  of 
both  tragedy  and  comedy.”  —  Edward  Capps. 


DRAMATIC  performances  in  ancient  Greece 
were  given  always  out-doors  in  places  of 
assembly  open  to  the  sky.  Originally  the 
country  folk  sat  on  the  ground  on  a  sloping  hill-side 
and  watched  the  dancing  and  the  action  which  were 
enacted  below  them  about  an  altar  on  a  level  floor  of 
earth.  The  developed  theater  was  an  amphitheater 
of  considerable  size,  and  was  composed  of  three  parts; 
the  auditorium  {theatron  or  cavea ),  where  the  spec¬ 
tators  sat,  the  orchestra ,  or  level  circular  dancing  floor, 
and  the  scene-buildings ,  which  furnished  a  back¬ 
ground  for  the  action  and  provided  dressing  rooms, 
etc.,  for  the  actors.  The  slope  of  a  hill  was  gener¬ 
ally  chosen  for  the  auditorium,  to  save  labor  of  con¬ 
struction.  The  seats  were  at  first  of  wood,  as  was 
the  case  in  the  theater  at  Athens  during  the  fifth  cen¬ 
tury  b.c.  Later,  permanent  seats  of  stone  were  em¬ 
ployed.  As  the  auditorium  was  shaped  somewhat  like 
a  horseshoe,  artificial  elevation  of  the  sides  for  the 
seats  on  either  side  of  the  orchestra  was  necessary. 
To  facilitate  the  entrance  and  exit  of  the  audience, 
stairs  ran  from  the  orchestra  to  the  top,  thus  dividing 
the  auditorium  into  a  number  of  wedge-shaped  sections 
of  tiers  of  seats.  In  the  larger  theaters  it  was  also 
found  desirable  to  have  a  wide  passage  (diazoma) , 

172 


THE  GREEK  THEATER 


173 


one-half  to  two-thirds  of  the  distance  from  the  orches¬ 
tra  to  the  top,  dividing  the  structure  into  a  lower  and 
an  upper  section. 

The  orchestra  (the  word  in  Greek  means  dancing- 
place)  was  a  complete  circle  and  was  originally  of 
leveled  hard  earth,  although  later,  in  Roman  times, 
it  was  paved  with  stone  or  marble.  Entering  the 
orchestra  on  both  sides  were  passage-ways  (called 


Fig.  44.  Ground-Plan  of  Theater  (Epidaurus) 


parodi)  by  means  of  which  the  entrance  of  the  chorus 
was  effected.  Actors  also  might  enter  and  depart 
through  the  parodi  and  before  and  after  the  per¬ 
formance  these  passages  were  naturally  used  by  the 
spectators. 

Behind  the  orchestra  were  the  scene-buildings.  In 
early  times  there  stood  at  this  place  a  simple  dressing- 
room  for  the  convenience  of  the  actors  and  the  chorus. 
This  tent,  or  booth  (Greek,  skene ;  Latin,  scaena;  Eng. 
scene),  originally  of  skins,  then  of  wood,  finally  was 
erected  as  a  permanent  structure  of  stone  and  natu¬ 
rally  came  to  be  used,  not  merely  as  a  dressing-room 


174 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


and  place  of  storage  for  properties,  but  also  as  a  back- 
scene  or  background  for  the  action  of  the  drama.  Hence 
the  derivation  of  the  English  word  scenery.  Fronting 
the  scene-building  proper  was  a  decorated  wall  or  pro¬ 
scenium,  a  covered  place  ten  to  thirteen  feet  in  height, 
of  shallow  depth,  with  a  flat  or  sloping  roof.  In  Greek 
tragedy  the  action  generally  takes  place  before  a  temple 
or  a  palace  and  accordingly  the  front  of  the  proscenium 
represented  such  a  scene,  as  its  front  wall  could  be 
decorated  with  columns  and  statues.  The  front  wall 
was  pierced  by  three,  later  by  five,  doors,  which  served 
as  entrance  and  exit  for  the  actors.  The  proscenium 
also  served  to  join  the  parascenia,  the  two  symmetri¬ 
cally  projecting  wings  of  the  developed  scene-buildings. 

Of  scenery  and  decorations  in  the  Greek  theater  of 
the  fifth  and  fourth  centuries  b.c.  our  information  is 
scanty.  No  curtain  was  employed  and  the  mounting 
must  have  been  extremely  simple,  leaving  much  to  the 
imagination  of  the  spectators.  But  this  does  not  mean 
that  the  ancient  plays  were  given  in  primitive  fashion. 
Modern  presentations  of  classical  and  Shakespearean 
drama  have  shown  us  how  effective  and  impressive 
really  great  plays  may  be  when  they  are  produced 
with  the  utmost  simplicity  of  background  and  scenery. 
Few  changes  of  scene  are  required  in  the  extant  Greek 
tragedies;  Aristophanic  comedy  demands  more.  In  the 
Suppliants  of  Aeschylus  an  altar  alone  is  needed.  In 
only  two  of  the  extant  tragedies  is  the  scene  changed. 
In  the  Eumenides  of  Aeschylus  the  action  shifts  from 
Apollo’s  temple  at  Delphi  to  the  temple  of  Athena  at 
Athens,  and  in  the  Ajax  of  Sophocles  there  is  a  change 
from  the  tent  of  the  hero  to  a  place  by  the  sea-shore. 
Tradition  assigns  to  Sophocles  the  “invention”  of  scene¬ 
painting;  painted  canvas  or  boards  ( pinaces )  could 
be  placed  between  the  pillars  of  the  proscenium. 
Statues  might  be  put  before  palace  or  temple.  We  hear 
of  other  scenic  accessories  and  machinery:  e.g.,  the 
machine  ( mechane ),  or  crane,  often  employed  by 


Fig.  45.  The  Theater  at  Epidaurus 


Fig.  46.  The  Theater  of  Dionysus  at  Athens 


THE  GREEK  THEATER 


175 


Euripides,  by  means  of  which  a  god,  or  a  hero  could  be 
raised  or  lowered  (this  device  is  the  famous  deus  ex 
machina ,  or  “  god  from  the  machine  ”) ;  and  the 
eccyclema,  or  moving  platform  on  wheels.  This  last 
conventional  contrivance,  of  construction  and  appear¬ 
ance  unknown  to  us,  served  to  disclose  to  the  spectators 
the  interior  of  the  scene-building.  For  example,  when 
an  act  of  violence  resulting  in  death  had  taken  place 
within  —  it  was  a  convention  of  the  Greek  theater  that 
such  deeds  should  not  occur  before  the  eyes  of  the 
spectators — it  was  possible  by  the  use  of  the  eccy¬ 
clema ,  to  roll  out  of  doors  the  group  of  persons  in¬ 
volved.  The  later  Greek  theater  seems  to  have  been 
provided  with  numerous  other  scenic  accessories,  such 
as  the  periacti,  or  large  revolving  triangular  prisms, 
which  were  decorated  on  their  three  faces  with  different 
scenes  thus  allowing  for  a  change  of  scene;  the 
bronteion,  or  thunder-making  apparatus,  consisting  of 
a  sheet  of  metal  upon  which  stones  were  thrown;  and 
Charon’s  Steps ,  or  trap-door,  by  means  of  which,  for 
example,  the  ghost  of  Darius  in  the  Persians  of  Aeschy¬ 
lus  could  suddenly  appear.  An  example  of  this  device 
is  found  in  the  theater  at  Eretria  in  Euboea,  where  an 
underground  passage-way  runs  from  behind  the  scene- 
buildings  to  the  middle  of  the  orchestra  and  steps  lead 
to  the  surface. 

Our  discussion  of  the  physical  aspect  of  the  Greek 
theater  must  now  return  to  the  scene-buildings,  or, 
more  accurately,  to  the  proscenium  and  to  a  most  in¬ 
teresting  and  much-vexed  question.  Did  the  Greek 
theater  of  the  fifth  and  fourth  centuries  b.c.  have  and 
employ  a  raised  stage?  Until  recent  years  the  existence 
of  a  stage  was  not  doubted.  Vitruvius,  the  celebrated 
Roman  writer  on  architecture,  who  lived  in  the  time  of 
Augustus,  describes,  in  his  extant  work,  De  Architec¬ 
tural  the  Greek  theater  as  having  a  lofty  stage.  Re¬ 
mains  of  a  stage  have  been  found  in  some  Greek 
theaters.  The  Roman  theater  had  a  stage.  The 
modern  theater  is  always  thus  provided.  Yet  a  ma- 


176 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


jority  of  Greek  scholars  today  believe  that  no  elevated 
stage  was  in  use  in  the  Greek  theater  of  the  fifth  and 
fourth  centuries  b.c.,  and  that,  in  consequence,  both 
actors  and  chorus  performed  on  the  level  dancing- 
floor,  the  orchestra.  This  view  is  held  for  the  following 
reasons.  In  the  extant  plays  there  are  numerous 
passages  necessitating  intimate  action  between  actors 
and  chorus,  action  which  would  be  difficult,  if  not 
impossible,  if  they  were  separated  by  a  lofty  platform. 
Professor  Capps  has  shown  that  in  the  forty-four 
extant  dramas  the  action  requires  that  the  chorus 
pass  over  the  boundary  —  conceived  to  be  the  edge 
of  a  ten-foot  stage  which  separated  actors  and 
chorus  —  at  least  sixty-eight  times,  the  actors 
thirty-nine  times,  and  chorus  and  actors  together 
nine  times.  For  example,  in  the  Iphigenia  among 
the  T  aurians  of  Euripides  the  heroine  touches 
and  embraces  each  member  of  the  chorus  when 
she  is  entreating  them  to  preserve  her  secret.  In  the 
comedies  actual  physical  contact  between  actors  and 
chorus  is  extremely  frequent.  The  Greek  proscenium, 
furthermore,  was  much  too  narrow  to  accommodate  the 
action  of  a  play.  Of  course  the  roof  of  the  proscenium 
could  be  used,  and  was  used  occasionally,  by  an  actor 
in  the  role  of  a  god,  or  a  watchman,  as  in  the  scene  at 
the  beginning  of  the  Agamemnon.  No  theater  of  the 
fifth  century  is  in  existence.  In  the  fourth  century 
theater,  as  at  Athens,  no  traces  of  a  stage  are  to  be 
found.  The  remains  of  a  stage  in  some  existing  Greek 
theaters  may  be  accounted  for  by  the  fact  that  these 
structures  were  remodeled  and  changed  in  the  Roman 
period.  The  Roman  theater  did  have  an  elevated 
stage  and  it  is  perhaps  the  Graeco-Roman  theater  which 
is  described  by  Vitruvius  in  the  first  century  b.c.  No 
confusion  resulted  by  having  both  actors  and  chorus 
perform  on  the  same  level  because  they  were  differenti¬ 
ated  in  costume  and  appearance;  the  members  of  the 
chorus  would  withdraw  to  either  side  or  to  the  rear  of 
the  roomy  orchestra  when  the  dialogue  proper  was 


THE  GREEK  THEATER 


177 


taking  place.  Nor  was  there  any  difficulty  with  re¬ 
gard  to  seeing,  since  the  spectators  were  seated  on  a 
steep  incline  and  could  look  down  into  the  orchestra 
with  unobstructed  view;  no  elevated  platform  was 
needed,  then,  and  would  have  been  an  interference 
to  the  action. 

Every  city  and  town  throughout  the  Greek  world 
had  its  theater.  The  best  preserved  of  all  Greek 
theaters  is  that  at  Epidaurus  (Fig.  45)  in  the  Pelopon¬ 
nesus,  in  the  auditorium  of  which  some  of  the  end  seats 
on  the  sides  only  are  missing.  It  was  much  larger  than 
the  theater  at  Athens  and  could  accommodate  perhaps 
thirty  thousand  spectators.  The  orchestra,  a  perfect 
circle  surrounded  by  a  ring  of  limestone,  is  sixty-five 
feet  in  diameter.  The  proscenium  is  about  seventy- 
five  feet  long  and  eleven  and  one-half  feet  high.  As 
is  usually  the  case  in  Greek  theaters,  the  acoustics  in 
the  theater  at  Epidaurus  are  excellent;  a  person  in  the 
orchestra  speaking  in  a  clear  voice  can  be  distinctly 
heard  in  the  farthest  removed  seats. 

The  largest  theater  in  Greece  was  that  of  Megalo¬ 
polis,  seating  twice  as  many  spectators  as  the  Athenian 
theater,  with  an  orchestra  no  less  than  ninety-nine  feet 
in  diameter.  Little  of  this  theater  is  preserved.  Re¬ 
mains  of  theaters  have  been  found  in  many  places 
throughout  Greek  lands,  as  for  example  at  Delphi, 
Eretria,  Sicyon,  Thoricus,  Oropus,  Delos,  and  Perga- 
mum. 

No  Greek  theater  possesses  such  interest  for  us  and 
arouses  such  veneration  as  the  Athenian  Theater  of 
Dionysus  (Fig.  46),  located  on  the  steep  slope  of  the  hill 
at  the  southeastern  corner  of  the  Acropolis.  On  this  site 
were  presented  the  dramatic  masterpieces  of  Aeschy¬ 
lus,  Sophocles,  Euripides,  and  Aristophanes.  The  seats 
of  the  auditorium  originally  were  of  wood,  later  of 
stone.  The  stone  seats  which  partly  cover  the  site  to¬ 
day  belong  to  the  time  of  Lycurgus,  Athenian  minister 
of  the  treasury,  338-326  b.c.,  who  rebuilt  the  theater 


178 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


with  limestone,  with  an  orchestra  of  a  diameter  of 
sixty-four  feet  six  inches  (sixty  Greek  feet),  and  a 
stone  scene-building,  one  hundred  and  fifty-two  feet 
in  breadth  by  twenty-one  feet  in  depth.  The  theater 
was  rebuilt  several  times  in  Hellenistic  and  in  Roman 
times,  and  orchestra  and  scene-buildings  have  been  re¬ 
peatedly  remodeled.  But  the  Athenian  theater  un¬ 
fortunately,  unlike  that  at  Epidaurus,  has  suffered 
sadly  in  the  passing  of  the  centuries;  all  the  upper 
tiers  of  seats  have  been  carried  away. 

The  stone  benches  which  remain  are  without  backs, 
but  are  cut  so  as  to  allow  plenty  of  room  from  front 
to  back  and  for  the  feet  of  the  spectators.  At  a  later 
date,  a  circular  tier  composed  of  extremely  comfortable 
chairs  of  marble  with  backs  was  added  as  a  front  row. 
These  chairs,  which  remain  today,  were  for  ecclesiastic 
and  civic  dignitaries.  In  the  exact  center  is  a  commodi¬ 
ous  throne  with  arms,  which  is  elaborately  decorated 
with  designs  in  low  relief.  There  are  borings  in  the 
arms  showing  that  metal  supports  upheld  a  canopy  to 
shield  from  the  sun  the  august  head  of  the  occupant. 
The  inscription  on  the  throne  informs  us  that  this  best 
seat  in  the  theater  was  for  the  use  of  the  High  Priest 
of  Dionysus.  In  the  time  of  the  Roman  emperor  Nero 
(first  century  a.d.)  a  stage,  with  a  new  proscenium,  was 
built  infringing  upon  the  full  circle  of  the  orchestra. 
A  marble  pavement  was  laid  as  a  flooring  for  the 
orchestra,  which  previously  had  been  hard  earth,  and 
a  balustrade  of  marble  was  constructed  to  protect  the 
spectators  from  injury  during  gladiatorial  exhibitions. 
The  inept  sculptured  frieze  of  the  front  wall  of  the 
stage,  which  is  today  conspicuous,  was  put  in  place  in 
the  third  or  the  fourth  century  a.d.,  when  a  certain 
Phaedrus  was  governor  of  Attica. 

The  seating  capacity  of  the  Athenian  theater  was 
about  seventeen  thousand,  according  to  the  calculations 
of  archaeologists.  Possibly  somewhat  more  could  be 
crowded  in.  Certainly  Plato’s  reference  to  the  presence 
of  thirty  thousand  spectators  is  a  rough  estimate,  or 
rather  guess. 


THE  GREEK  THEATER 


179 


The  Production  of  Plays 

The  modern  theater,  which  is  largely  a  commercial 
venture  and  which  primarily  exists  for  the  purpose 
of  providing  amusement  and  entertainment  for  its 
patrons,  presents  theatrical  performances  through¬ 
out  the  year.  Altogether  different  was  the  situation  in 
ancient  Greece.  The  Greek  drama  was  founded  on 
religious  observances,  and  plays  were  given  only  twice 
a  year  and  then  for  very  limited  periods.  These  occa¬ 
sions,  when  tragedies,  comedies,  and  dithyrambs  were 
presented,  were  the  two  great  special  festivals  in  honor 
of  Dionysus,  the  patron  god  of  wine,  fertility,  and  the 
drama,  namely,  the  festival  of  the  Lenaea  (the  wine¬ 
press),  at  the  end  of  January,  and  the  City  Dionysia, 
at  the  end  of  March.  A  lesser  festival,  the  Rural  Dio¬ 
nysia ,  was  celebrated  in  country  districts  of  Attica  at 
the  end  of  December,  when  the  successful  plays  which 
had  been  given  at  Athens  were  repeated.  The 
most  important  of  the  festivals  was  the  City  Dionysia, 
which  lasted  at  least  five  days  and  was  devoted  pri¬ 
marily  to  tragedy,  although  some  comedies  also  were  en¬ 
acted.  The  Lenaea  was  the  festival  of  comedy,  al¬ 
though  the  production  of  tragedies  was  a  late  addition 
(about  433  b.c.).  The  dramatic  performances  followed 
each  other  continuously  from  early  morning  until  even¬ 
ing;  at  the  Dionysia  tragedies  were  given  in  the  morn¬ 
ing  and  comedies  in  the  afternoon.  These  dramas  were 
all  new  plays  during  the  fifth  century,  as  original  play¬ 
wrights  and  new  dramas  were  extremely  numerous  at 
this  time.  In  the  fourth  century,  however,  when  Attic 
dramatic  and  literary  genius  was  on  the  wane,  the  prac¬ 
tice  of  reviving  the  masterpieces  of  the  past  became 
popular  and  indeed  necessary. 

The  presentation  of  plays  in  Athens  was  controlled 
by  the  government,  and  poets,  actors,  and  choregi  were 
selected  by  State  officials.  The  festival  of  the  City 
Dionysia  was  in  charge  of  the  Archon  Eponymus ;  the 
Lenaea  was  supervised  by  the  Archon  Basileus.  A 


180 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


tragic  poet  who  wished  to  compete  in  the  dramatic 
competition  submitted  his  plays  to  the  appropriate 
Archon.  In  the  first  part  of  the  fifth  century  a  tetralogy 
(i.e.,  three  tragedies  and  a  satyric  play)  in  which  a 
single  theme  was  developed,  was  presented  and  from  the 
numerous  dramas  offered  the  Archon  selected  the  three 
tetralogies  judged  best.  To  these  he  “  gave  a  chorus,” 
or  rather,  assigned  a  choregus.  The  choregus  (literally 
chorus-leader)  was  a  wealthy  citizen  whose  duty  it  was 
to  choose  and  to  pay  the  expenses  of  a  dramatic  chorus. 
It  was  obligatory  also  for  him  to  engage  a  trainer  or 
“  coach  ”  for  the  presentation,  to  pay  for  the  musical 
accompaniment  furnished  by  the  flute-players,  and 
also  to  defray  the  expense  of  the  costumes.  This  duty 
was  called  the  choregia  and  was  one  of  the  liturgies ,  or 
public  services,  exacted  by  the  State  as  taxes  on  wealthy 
Athenians. 

The  minimum  expense  of  the  choregia  was  consider¬ 
able  and  might  be  great  if  the  choregus  were  wealthy, 
generous,  and  eager  to  win.  In  an  oration  of  Lysias 
a  speaker  affirms  that  he  spent,  within  seven  years, 
about  $540  for  a  tragic  choregia,  $288  for  a  comic 
choregia,  and  no  less  than  $900  for  a  dithyrambic 
chorus  of  men,  and  $270  for  a  boys’  chorus. 

The  poet  himself  in  the  early  part  of  the  fifth  century 
might  act  in  his  own  plays,  or  select  his  actors.  Later, 
however,  the  State  took  charge  of  this  also  and  dis¬ 
tributed  by  lot  the  protagonists,  or  chief  actors,  among 
the  poets.  A  professional  class  of  trainers,  actors,  and 
singers  arose  who  were  available  for  the  dramatic 
festivals.  The  trainer  was  called  a  didascalus,  or 
teacher  of  a  chorus.  To  “  teach  ”  a  play  became 
synonymous  with  producing  it. 

The  huge  audience  of  many  thousands  assembled  in 
the  theater  at  Athens  early  in  the  morning  for  the  per¬ 
formances  which  were  to  continue  through  the  day.  If 
the  spectators  were  wise,  they  brought  cushions  for 
comfort,  and  likewise  refreshments.  The  weather  was 
pretty  certain  to  be  pleasant  as  the  festivals  were  held 


THE  GREEK  THEATER 


181 


at  a  time  when  in  Greece  open-air  performances  are  de¬ 
lightful,  and  the  sun  is  warm  but  not  oppressively  hot. 
The  admission  was  originally  free,  but  because  of  the 
crowds  competing  for  seats  the  practice  was  introduced 
of  selling  tickets  (usually  small  stamped  leaden  disks) 
in  advance  for  one  day’s  session  at  the  small  price  of 
two  obols  (six  cents)  for  all  seats  without  distinction 
of  location,  with  the  exception  of  the  comparatively 
small  number  of  front  seats  reserved  for  priests, 
officials,  and  honored  guests.  At  the  end  of  the  fifth 
century  we  find  the  State  instituting  a  fund  (the  Theoric 
Fund)  which  provided  admittance  fees  to  any  citizens 
who  were  too  poor  to  pay  for  their  entrance.  This 
theater  fund  for  the  needy  was  not  established  on  the 
principle  of  the  Roman  panem  et  circenses  for  the  pro¬ 
letariat.  The  Greek  theater  was  a  religious  and  educa¬ 
tional  institution.  All  citizens,  therefore,  should  for 
their  own  welfare  and  that  of  the  State  be  encouraged 
and  assisted  to  attend  and  this  was  made  possible  by 
the  Theoric  Fund.  All  classes  of  the  population,  in¬ 
cluding  women,  children,  resident  aliens,  and  slaves 
could  attend,  athough  adult  male  citizens  must  have 
formed  the  large  majority  of  the  spectators.  Many 
strangers,  too,  were  present  for  the  celebration  of  the 
City  Dionysia,  which  enjoyed  wide  fame.  Navigation 
at  the  end  of  March  was  safe  and,  furthermore,  this 
was  the  time  of  the  year  when  the  tribute  was  sent  to 
Athens  by  the  allies.  At  the  end  of  each  competition 
of  three  tetralogies,  the  judges,  apparently  five  in  num¬ 
ber,  who  had  been  chosen  by  lot  to  avoid  any  possibil¬ 
ity  of  partiality,  rendered  their  decision.  The  victorious 
poet  and  his  choregus  were  crowned  with  ivy.  In  the 
dithyrambic  contests  the  successful  choregus  received 
a  tripod.  To  each  of  the  competing  dramatists  was 
given  a  sum  of  money  and  the  records  of  the  awards 
were  inscribed  upon  public  tablets. 

The  subject  of  costume,  particularly  in  tragedy, 
bristles  with  difficulties,  and  much  foolishness  has  been 
written  about  it.  Vase-paintings,  and  the  literature 


182 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


give  us  some  light,  although  all  of  this  information 
is  by  no  means  contemporaneous  or  complete.  The 
Greek  tragic  actor  of  tradition  is  truly  a  portentous 
figure.  He  is  represented  as  greatly  increasing  his 
height  by  the  use  of  the  cothurnus  (buskin),  a  boot 
with  prodigiously  thick  soles;  he  is  supposed  to  have 
padded  his  body  to  grandiose  proportions  and  to  have 
increased  his  height  by  wearing  a  towering  head-dress; 
upon  his  face  he  is  represented  as  wearing  a  grotesque 
mask.  We  are  now  inclined  to  believe,  however,  that 
this  impressive,  but  rather  absurd,  personage  must  be 
“  scaled  down  ”  to  proportions  of  common-sense  and  to 
accord  with  the  Greek  sense  of  propriety.  The  evidence 
for  the  use  of  all  this  apparatus  is  late.  While  the 
cothurnus  or  buskin  seems  to  have  been  commonly  worn 
by  the  tragic  actor,  at  least  in  later  times,  the  concep¬ 
tion  of  the  extreme  thickness  of  its  sole  is  based  partly 
on  very  late  literary  evidence  and  partly  on  the  mis¬ 
interpretation  of  works  of  art.  The  “  invention  ”  of 
tragic  costume  is  traditionally  credited  to  Aeschylus. 
In  general  it  may  be  reasonably  asserted  that  actors  and 
chorus  were  clad  in  costumes  befitting  their  roles.  The 
nature  and  needs  of  comedy  gave  rise  to  variety  and 
picturesqueness  of  costume,  especially  as  to  the  mem¬ 
bers  of  the  chorus,  who  impersonated,  in  the  Old 
Comedy,  animals,  birds,  etc.  Women  did  not  appear 
as  actors  in  Greek  plays;  men  or  youths  assumed  all 
feminine  parts. 

The  origin  of  the  use  of  the  mask  is  uncertain.  Some 
have  naively  thought  that  the  mouthpiece  of  the  mask 
served  to  magnify  the  actor’s  voice.  But  the  physical 
construction  and  contour  of  the  Greek  theater  with  the 
concave  auditorium  of  the  steep  hillside  provided  re¬ 
markable  acoustics,  as  may  be  proved  by  actual  demon¬ 
stration  today  in  the  theater  at  Epidaurus,  where  the 
words,  clearly  enunciated  merely,  of  a  person  in  the 
orchestra  are  easily  heard  in  the  most  remote  part  of 
the  auditorium.  It  is  possible  that  the  mask  is  of  reli¬ 
gious  origin  and  that  it  was  introduced  to  enable  the 


THE  GREEK  THEATER 


183 


actor  to  assume  a  role  appropriate  to  the  performance 
of  religious  rites  in  honor  of  the  god  Dionysus.  Its  use 
indubitably  had  many  advantages;  for  example,  it  per¬ 
mitted  one  actor  to  play  several  parts  —  an  economical 
device  —  and  men  to  assume  feminine  roles.  While 
facial  expression  was  lost  through  its  employment,  yet 
in  any  case  the  large  size  of  the  open-air  Greek  theater 
would  have  largely  nullified  that  asset  of  the  modern 
actor’s  art.  In  our  large  indoor  theaters  and  opera- 
houses  the  play  of  features  of  the  actors  is  largely  lost 
to  spectators  in  remote  seats,  often  even  when  they  are 
provided  with  opera-glasses. 

Three  actors,  the  protagonist,  who  assumed  the  lead¬ 
ing  role,  the  deuteragonist,  and  the  tritagonist,  were 
sufficient  by  the  change  of  mask  and  costumes  to  as¬ 
sume  all  the  roles  in  a  majority  of  the  plays.  It  is  a 
mistake,  however,  to  assume  that  a  fourth  actor  could 
not  be  employed.  Certain  tragedies  (e.g.,  the  Prome¬ 
theus  and  the  Oedipus  at  Colonus )  could  have  been 
given  only  with  great  difficulty,  and  some  comedies 
(e.g.,  the  Frogs  of  Aristophanes)  could  not  have  been 
presented  at  all  with  fewer  than  four  actors.  Mutes 
were  frequently  used,  as  well  as  extra  performers  for 
crowds,  attendants,  slaves,  and  others.  At  Athens,  un¬ 
like  Rome,  the  profession  of  the  actor  was  in  good 
social  repute,  and  in  the  fourth  century  and  thereafter 
there  flourished  Actors’  Guilds  or  Unions. 

Of  the  music  in  the  Greek  drama  we  know  little.  A 
flute-player,  occasionally  also  a  harpist,  in  the  orches¬ 
tra,  furnished  the  simple  musical  accompaniment  for 
the  lyrics  and  the  dance  evolutions  of  the  chorus.  The 
dialogue  portion  of  the  play,  written  in  iambic  trimeters 
(i.e.,  six  iambic  feet),  was  spoken  or  declaimed; 
trochaics  and  anapaests  were  delivered  in  recitative; 
other  meters  might  be  accompanied;  the  lyrical  pas¬ 
sages  were  always  sung  to  music.  The  singing  of  the 
chorus  was  in  unison  and  unlike  modern  opera  could  be 
clearly  understood,  as  the  musical  element  was  sub¬ 
ordinated  to  the  recitation.  In  the  latter  part  of  the 


184 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


fifth  century  there  was  a  tendency  to  emphasize  and 
elaborate  the  musical  element  to  a  degree  formerly  not 
customary.  Euripides  especially  was  reprehended  by 
the  conservative  Aristophanes  for  this  practice.  The 
chorus  generally  sang  alone,  as  in  the  stasima  (choral 
lyrics  proper),  though  choristers  and  actor  might  join 
in  a  lyric  passage,  as  in  the  commus  (a  lamentation). 
A  monody  was  a  solo  by  an  actor.  A  fine  sonorous 
voice,  clear  enunciation,  and  exact  rendering  of  the 
verse  were  absolutely  essential  to  an  actor’s  success  in 
the  Greek  theater.  The  original  dithyrambic  chorus 
had  consisted  of  fifty  members.  In  the  earliest  extant 
play,  the  Suppliants  of  Aeschylus,  the  chorus  is  actu¬ 
ally  composed  of  the  fifty  daughters  of  Danaus. 
Aeschylus  reduced  this  unwieldy  number  to  twelve, 
which  was  subsequently  raised  by  Sophocles  to  fifteen. 
This  increase  probably  allowed  superior  marching  and 
dancing  evolutions.  The  leader  of  the  chorus  was 
called  the  coryphaeus.  Twenty-four  constituted  the 
number  of  the  chorus  in  comedy. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

GREEK  TRAGEDY 

GREEK  tragedy,  according  to  Aristotle,  in  his 
Poetics ,  originated  among  the  Dorians  in  the 
worship  of  Dionysus,  the  god  of  vegetation, 
fertility,  and  in  particular,  the  vine.1  It  was  the  custom 
in  the  spring,  when  the  wine  of  the  previous  autumn 
was  broached,  for  the  country-folk  to  hold  festival  and 
to  sing  and  dance  in  honor  of  the  god  of  wine.  This 
song,  known  as  the  dithyramb  —  a  choral  lyric  relat¬ 
ing  the  adventures  of  Dionysus  —  was  performed  in  a 
circular  dancing-place  ( orchestra )  to  the  accompani¬ 
ment  of  the  flute,  by  a  chorus  of  fifty  men  and  boys, 
dressed  as  satyrs,  the  sportive  attendants  of  the  god. 
The  dithyramb,  according  to  tradition,  had  been  de-) 
veloped  by  Arion  —  originally  of  Lesbos,  but  resident 
at  Corinth  —  who  had  the  leader  of  the  chorus  address 
his  fellows.  However  this  may  be,  tragedy  arose  when 
Thespis  (about  535  b.c.),  of  Icaria  in  Attica,  imperson¬ 
ated  a  character  alluded  to  in  the  song  and  conversed 
with  the  chorus,  or  its  leader.  Aeschylus  added  a 
second  actor  and  Sophocles  a  third.  Dialogue  natu¬ 
rally  and  gradually  developed  at  the  expense  of  the  orig¬ 
inal  lyric  element,  plots  became  more  complex,  and 
stately  and  dignified  language  was  used.  The  early 
satyric  element,  playful  but  distinct  from  comedy,  was 

1  The  traditional  view  here  given  has  recently  been  attacked  by  two 
scholars,  who  are,  however,  not  in  agreement.  Professor  William  Ridge¬ 
way  maintains  that  the  origin  of  Greek  tragedy  is  to  be  found  in  the 
ritual  performed  by  the  chorus  worshipping  dead  heroes  at  the  tomb. 
Professor  Gilbert  Murray,  on  the  contrary,  thinks  the  origin  is  in  the 
ritual  which  celebrated  the  annual  death  and  rebirth  of  vegetation,  a 
rite  which  was  a  feature  of  the  cult  of  Dionysus.  A  composite  origin, 
however,  for  the  gradually  developing  tragic  art  may  reasonably  be 
assumed,  since  various  elements  may  be  seen  in  the  fully  perfected  drama. 

18S 


186  GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 

developed  independently  of  tragedy,  but  was  conserva¬ 
tively  retained,  being  incorporated  in  the  short  con¬ 
cluding  play  of  the  fifth  century  tetralogy.  It  may  be 
remarked  here  that  only  two  examples  of  the  satyric 
drama  are  extant  —  the  Cyclops  of  Euripides,  and  the 
recently  discovered  Trackers  of  Sophocles. 

The  Greek  word  tragddos  means  “  goat-singer,”  but 
why  the  tragic  singer  was  so  called  is  not  clear.  Per¬ 
haps  it  was  because  of  the  singers’  original  satyr 
costume  or,  more  probably,  because  a  goat  may  have 
been  given  as  a  prize. 

Epic  and  lyric  poetry  had  preceded  tragedy  as  popu¬ 
lar  and  perfected  art-forms.  The  new  tragic  art,  there¬ 
fore,  had  abundant  materials  for  its  use.  Subject- 
matter  was  obtained  from  that  treasure-house  of 
ancient  story,  the  great  epics,  both  Homer  and  the 
Cyclic  Poems .  Lyric  poetry,  particularly  the  dithy¬ 
ramb,  with  its  religious  origin  and  feeling,  poetic  idiom, 
and  varied  meters,  lent  its  resources  to  the  tragic  choral 
odes.  In  the  dialogue  element  of  the  drama  there  was 
substituted  for  the  epic  dactylic  hexameter,  as  better 
suited  to  conversation,  the  iambic  verse  of  six  feet 
(iambic  trimeter)  which  had  been  perfected  by  Archi¬ 
lochus  of  Paros  (seventh  century  b.c.). 

The  Extant  Tragedies 

Of  the  hundreds  of  tragedies  written  during  the  great 
period  of  the  Attic  drama  only  thirty-three  are  extant. 
We  possess  seven  plays  of  Aeschylus,  seven  of 
Sophocles,  and  nineteen  of  Euripides.  Scanty  frag¬ 
ments  only  remain  of  plays  written  by  Aeschylus’  pred¬ 
ecessors,  Choerilus,  Pratinas,  and  the  great  Phryni- 
chus.  Two  plays  of  Phrynichus  are  of  special  interest, 
the  Phoenissae  (476  b.c.),  of  which  the  theme  was  the 
Greek  victory  at  Salamis,  and  the  Capture  of  Miletus , 
which  dramatized  the  loss  of  that  Greek  Ionian  city  to 
Darius.  These  two  plays,  written  on  contemporary 
historical  events,  show  that  Aeschylus  in  writing  his 


GREEK  TRAGEDY 


187 


historical  play,  the  Persians ,  had  been  anticipated  in 
this  novel  choice  of  story,  although  the  practice  did  not 
become  popular. 

Aeschylus,  born  in  525  b.c.  at  Eleusis,  fought  at 
Marathon  and  was  present  at  Salamis.  The  period 
of  his  dramatic  activity  falls  between  499  and  458 
during  which  time  he  won  thirteen  victories.  To  him 
are  traditionally  ascribed  the  introduction  of  a  second 
actor,  the  lessening  of  the  importance  of  the  chorus, 
and  the  invention  of  tragic  costume.  He  died  in 
Sicily  in  456  b.c.  His  seven  plays,  given  below  in 
chronological  order,  will  be  very  briefly  summarized. 

The  Suppliant  Women  shows  its  early  origin  by  the 
overshadowing  importance  of  the  chorus,  the  scant 
attention  paid  to  characterization,  and  the  compara¬ 
tive  absence  of  action.  The  scene  lies  near  Argos  and 
the  story  is  concerned  with  the  escape  of  the 
chorus,  the  fifty  daughters  of  Danaus,  from  Egypt 
to  avoid  marriage  with  their  cousins,  the  sons  of 
Aegyptus.  The  maidens  find  asylum  with  the  King 
of  Argos. 

The  scene  of  the  Persians  (472  b.c.)  lies  before 
the  palace  of  Xerxes,  at  Susa,  the  Persian  capital. 
The  chorus  is  composed  of  aged  Persian  councillors. 
The  theme  was  calculated  to  be  pleasing  to  an  Athe¬ 
nian  audience,  as  it  relates  the  rout  of  the  barbarian 
fleet  at  Salamis  and  the  despair  of  Xerxes,  who,  with 
his  royal  mother,  Atossa,  are  characters  in  the  drama. 
The  play  contains  a  poetic  and  extremely  vivid  narra¬ 
tion  of  the  great  sea-fight. 

The  Seven  against  Thebes  (467  b.c.),  aptly  charac¬ 
terized  by  Aristophanes  as  a  “  drama  full  of  Ares,” 
belongs  to  the  Theban  cycle  of  legend  and  deals  with 
the  fortunes  of  the  sons  of  Oedipus.  Eteocles,  the 
elder,  having  assumed  the  throne,  is  besieged  by  an 
Argive  army  gathered  by  his  brother  Polynices,  who 
had  been  expelled  from  Thebes.  In  the  assault  upon 
the  city  its  seven  gates  are  defended  by  Eteocles  and 


188 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


six  fellow  champions  and  attacked  by  Polynices  with 
an  equal  number  of  combatants.  The  brothers  fall 
by  each  other’s  hand.  The  Theban  councillors  decree 
honorable  burial  for  the  patriot  Eteocles,  while  the 
edict  declares  that  Polynices’  body  must  be  thrown  to 
the  dogs  and  the  vultures.  The  play  ends  with  the 
announcement  of  Antigone  that  she  will  defy  this  de¬ 
cree.. 

The  Prometheus  Bound ,  of  uncertain  date,  is  a 
magnificent  poetic  drama  and  is  one  of  the  most  im¬ 
pressive  of  all  the  Greek  tragedies.  It  has  been 
translated  by  Mrs.  Browning,  and  inspired  Shelley’s 
poetic  drama,  Prometheus  Unbound .  The  Titan  hero, 
Prometheus,  has  disobeyed  and  flouted  Zeus,  who  had 
wished  to  destroy  utterly  the  impotent  and  imperfect 
human  race,  by  stealing  from  Heaven  the  forbidden 
fire.  With  this  flame,  conveyed  in  the  fennel-stalk, 
he  has  succored  man  and  likewise  has  taught  him  the 
arts  of  civilization  and  cheers  his  heart  with  hope. 
For  this  grave  disobedience  the  hero  is  ruthlessly 
nailed  and  bound  to  a  rock  in  a  solitary  gorge  in 
Scythia.  The  chorus  is  composed  of  maidens,  the 
daughters  of  Oceanus,  who  come  to  give  him  sym¬ 
pathy.  In  his  torment  and  humiliation  the  hero  is 
visited  by  the  patronizing  Oceanus,  the  wandering  Io, 
and  Hermes,  messenger  of  Zeus.  Prometheus,  rely¬ 
ing  on  his  knowledge  of  a  secret,  namely,  that  Zeus, 
if  he  make  a  certain  marriage,  is  destined  to  be  de¬ 
throned  by  his  son,  is  obdurate.  Amid  thunder  and 
the  whirlwind  the  chasm  yawns  and  he,  together  with 
his  chorus,  sink  into  the  earth.  It  is  probable  that 
the  Prometheus  is  only  one  play  of  a  trilogy  and  that, 
in  a  drama  which  followed,  his  release  by  Heracles 
and  reconciliation  with  Zeus  were  represented. 

The  Orest  eta  (the  story  of  Orestes)  is  the  name 
given  to  the  only  extant  trilogy,  composed  of  the 
Agamemnon ,  Libation-Bearers ,  and  the  Eumenides. 
The  Agamemnon ,  the  greatest  of  the  Greek  plays  in  the 
sheer  poetic  merit  of  the  lyric  element,  relates  the 


GREEK  TRAGEDY 


189 


homecoming  of  the  victorious  general  Agamemnon 
from  Troy,  and  his  foul  murder  at  the  hands  of  his 
faithless  wife  Clytaemnestra,  and  her  paramour  Aegis- 
thus.  The  Libation-Bearers  tells  of  the  return  of 
Orestes,  son  of  Agamemnon,  from  exile  to  punish 
the  guilty  pair.  He  slays  them  both,  but  is  mad¬ 
dened  by  his  crime  and  flees  from  the  pursuing 
Furies  to  supplicate  Apollo,  at  whose  instigation  he 
had  accomplished  the  deed  of  vengeance.  In  the 
Eumenides ,  Orestes,  who  has  been  purified  by  Apollo, 
must  be  reconciled  with  the  Erinyes  (Furies).  Arriv¬ 
ing  at  Athens,  he  is  tried  before  the  Court  (known 
later  as  the  Areopagus).  The  vote  of  the  jury  of 
Athenian  elders  is  a  tie,  and  Athena,  as  presiding 
magistrate,  casts  her  vote  for  Orestes  and  thereby  he 
secures  acquittal.  The  Furies  are  pacified  by  the 
goddess  and  are  given  residence  beneath  the  hill,  the 
Areopagus.  Henceforth,  they  are  designated  Eumen¬ 
ides  (Kindly  Spirits),  guardians  of  the  land. 

Sophocles  (495-406  b.c.),  second  of  the  Athenian 
tragedians,  is  known  to  us  by  seven  extant  tragedies, 
all  of  the  greatest  interest  and  merit.  These  are,  in 
approximately  their  chronological  order,  Ajax ,  Antig¬ 
one,  Electra,  Oedipus  Tyr  annus,  Trachiniae  (the 
Women  of  Trachis ),  Philoctetes,  and  the  Oedipus  at 
Colonus . 

In  the  Ajax,  the  hero,  who  has  been  defeated  by 
Odysseus  in  the  contest  for  the  arms  of  Achilles,  seeks 
vengeance  upon  Agamemnon  and  Menelaus.  Made 
mad  by  Athena,  he  has  slain  a  herd  of  cattle,  mis¬ 
taking  them  for  his  enemies.  On  regaining  his  sanity, 
in  his  humiliation  he  commits  suicide.  Honorable 
burial,  at  first  denied  him  by  the  chiefs,  is  grudgingly 
granted  him  at  last  through  the  intercession  of  Odys¬ 
seus. 

The  Antigone  is  a  play  of  great  appeal  and  has  ever 
been  deservedly  admired.  It  is  a  sequel,  so  far  as 
action  is  concerned,  to  the  Seven  against  Thebes  of 


190 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Aeschylus.  Antigone,  despite  the  edict  of  Creon,  king 
of  Thebes,  gives  honorable  burial  to  her  slain  brother, 
Polynices,  who  is  pronounced  a  traitor  by  the  king.  In 
consequence  of  her  act  the  heroine  suffers  a  martyr’s 
death.  Creon’s  punishment  is  terrible,  for  the  death 
of  Antigone  is  followed  by  the  suicide  of  Haemon, 
his  son  and  Antigone’s  lover,  and  of  his  wife,  Eurydice. 

The  Electra  develops  the  same  theme  as  the  Liba¬ 
tion-Bearers  of  Aeschylus,  a  story  which  was  likewise 
used  by  Euripides  in  his  play  of  the  same  name.  It  tells 
of  the  return  of  Orestes,  of  the  vengeance  inflicted  by 
him  upon  his  guilty  mother  Clytaemnestra  and  Aegis- 
thus,  the  slayers  of  his  father.  His  intrepid  sister 
Electra  aids  and  abets  him  in  the  dread  deed. 

The  Oedipus  Tyr annus  ( Oedipus  the  King )  is  the 
greatest  of  all  the  Greek  plays  in  excellence  of  plot 
and  in  the  element  of  suspense.  It  is  quoted  by  Aris¬ 
totle  more  frequently  than  any  other  Greek  drama 
in  his  discussion  of  tragedy  in  the  Poetics . 

The  hero  had  come  to  Thebes  years  before  and  had 
found  the  city  oppressed  by  the  Sphinx.  Oedipus 
had  solved  the  riddle  of  the  monster  and  had  been  re¬ 
warded  with  the  throne.  He  had  married  Queen 
Jocasta,  the  widow  of  the  former  king  Laius.  At  the 
beginning  of  the  play  Thebes  is  suffering  from  a  devas¬ 
tating  pestilence.  Creon,  the  brother  of  the  Queen, 
brings  word  that  the  oracle  of  Apollo  at  Delphi  pro¬ 
claims  that  the  source  of  the  pollution,  the  unknown 
murderer  of  Laius,  must  be  discovered  and  expelled 
from  the  land.  Oedipus  pledges  himself  to  succor  his 
people,  and  vows  that  he  will  find  the  guilty  person 
upon  whose  head  he  pronounces  dread  curses.  Tire- 
sias,  the  blind  soothsayer,  summoned  before  the  king, 
refuses  to  tell  all  he  knows,  as  this  would  involve  the 
king  himself  in  guilt.  At  length,  the  aged  seer,  stung 
by  the  king’s  hot  words,  denounces  Oedipus  himself  as 
the  murderer.  Oedipus,  in  sore  wrath  at  this  accusa¬ 
tion,  so  unjust  as  he  believes,  accuses  Tiresias  as  the 
tool  of  Creon,  who,  he  thinks,  is  conspiring  for  the 


GREEK  TRAGEDY 


191 


throne.  The  queen  Jocasta,  to  quiet  the  fears  of 
Oedipus,  tells  him  that  oracles  are  not  to  be  trusted, 
since  Apollo  had  prophesied  Lams’  death  at  the  hand 
of  his  own  son,  whereas  the  babe  had  been  exposed 
on  the  mountain  and  Laius  had  been  slain  by  robbers, 
at  the  meeting  of  three  roads.  Jocasta’s  recital  alarms 
Oedipus,  as  he  had  once  met  and  slain  an  old  man  in 
Phocis  at  a  place  where  three  roads  meet.  Could  this 
have  been  Laius?  A  messenger  comes  from  Corinth 
—  Oedipus’  previous  home  —  to  report  the  death  of 
King  Polybus,  and  that  Oedipus  has  been  chosen  as 
his  successor.  Oedipus,  who  thinks  himself  the  son  of 
Polybus,  is  now  partly  relieved  from  his  fear  that  he 
may  fulfil  the  oracle,  which  said  that  he  was  destined 
to  slay  his  father  and  wed  his  mother.  The  messenger, 
to  dispel  all  dread  from  Oedipus’  mind,  assures  him 
that  he  is  not  the  son  of  Polybus  and  Merope,  but  a 
foundling,  a  babe  exposed  on  Mt.  Cithaeron,  whom  he 
himself  had  received  from  a  shepherd  of  Laius.  This 
shepherd  is  summoned  and  unwillingly  tells  the  whole 
truth.  All  now  is  known.  Jocasta,  in  horror  of  the 
situation,  hangs  herself,  and  Oedipus  puts  out  his  eyes 
that  they  may  be  dark  forever  “  when  naught  to  be 
seen  is  good.”  He  begs  Creon  that  he  may  be  sent 
forth  from  the  land.  The  play  ends  with  the  solemn 
utterance  of  the  Chorus: 

Ye  citizens  of  Thebes,  behold,  'tis  Oedipus  that  passeth  here, 

Who  read  the  riddle-word  of  Death,  and  mightiest  stood  of  mortal 
men, 

And  Fortune  loved  him,  and  the  folk  that  saw  him  turned  and 
looked  again. 

Lo,  he  is  fallen,  and  around  great  storms  and  the  out-reaching 
sea! 

Therefore,  0  Man,  beware,  and  look  toward  the  end  of  things 
that  be, 

The  last  of  sights,  the  last  of  days;  and  no  man’s  life  account 
as  gain 

Ere  the  full  tale  be  finished  and  the  darkness  find  him  without 
pain.  —  G.  Murray. 

The  Trachiniae  is  a  play  wherein  love  is  a  powerful 
motivating  element  in  the  action.  Deianira,  wife  of 


192 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Heracles,  to  regain  the  affections  of  her  absent  hus¬ 
band,  who  is  enamoured  of  a  captive  maiden,  Iole,  inno¬ 
cently  sends  him  a  love  gift,  a  robe.  This  garment  is 
deadly,  however,  as  it  had  been  anointed  with  the 
poisonous  blood  of  the  Centaur  Nessus,  who  had  been 
slain  by  Heracles.  Heracles,  having  put  on  the  gar¬ 
ment,  dies  in  agony,  while  Deianira,  in  despair,  slays 
herself. 

In  the  Philoctetes  the  poet  relates  how  Odysseus 
and  Neoptolemus,  the  young  son  of  Achilles,  come  to 
the  desolate  island  of  Lemnos  to  bring  the  hero  and 
his  bow  and  arrows,  formerly  the  weapon  of  Heracles, 
to  Troy.  Ten  years  before,  the  Greeks  had  aban¬ 
doned  Philoctetes,  as  he  had  been  bitten  on  the  foot 
by  a  venomous  snake,  and  the  wound  would  not  heal. 
Subsequently,  when  the  Greeks  learned  that  Troy 
could  not  be  taken  without  Philoctetes  and  his  weapon, 
the  mission  to  Lemnos  is  sent.  By  a  trick  of  the  wily 
Odysseus,  Neoptolemus  gains  possession  of  the  bow, 
but  later,  moved  by  the  despair  of  the  hero,  restores 
it.  This  development  in  the  character  of  young  Neop¬ 
tolemus  is  of  particular  interest.  The  play  is  con¬ 
cluded  by  a  device  favored  by  Euripides  —  the  inter¬ 
vention  of  the  deus  ex  machina.  The  deified  Heracles 
appears  and  commands  Philoctetes  to  go  to  Troy. 

The  Oedipus  at  Colonus  is  the  last  play  of  Sopho¬ 
cles’  long  and  happy  life  written  when  the  tragedian 
was  nearly  ninety  years  of  age.  But  the  drama  shows 
no  sign  of  failing  powers  and  is  characterized  by  re¬ 
ligious  feeling  and  great  poetic  beauty.  Particularly 
fine  is  the  ode  in  praise  of  Colonus,  which  was  the 
birthplace  of  the  dramatist  himself.  Hither  to  Colo¬ 
nus,  near  Athens,  the  aged  and  blind  Oedipus,  an 
exile  from  Thebes,  comes  for  refuge,  led  by  his  daugh¬ 
ter  Antigone.  He  is  welcomed  by  Theseus,  king  of 
Athens,  and  protected  from  Creon  of  Thebes,  who 
appears  to  take  him  back.  Here,  the  sorely- tried 
hero  at  last  finds*  eternal  rest.  Seen  only  by  Theseus, 
he  is  miraculously  translated  to  the  world  below. 


GREEK  TRAGEDY 


193 


To  Euripides  (480-406  b.c.)  fate  has  been  kind, 
as  the  dramatist’s  works  are  known  to  us  through 
nineteen  extant  plays.  These  are:  Alcestis,  Medea , 
Hippolytus,  Hecuba ,  Cyclops ,  Children  of  Heracles, 
Mad  Heracles,  Andromache ,  Suppliants,  Trojan  Wom¬ 
en,  Iphigenia  among  the  Taurians,  Ion,  Electra,  Helen, 
Phoenician  Women,  Orestes,  Iphigenia  at  Aulis,  Bac¬ 
chantes,  and  Rhesus.  The  story  of  only  a  few  of  the 
most  noteworthy  of  these  plays  may  be  indicated  here. 

The  Alcestis  (438  b.c.)  is  a  tale  of  a  wife’s  devotion. 
The  Fates  have  decreed  that  Admetus  of  Pherae  in 
Thessaly  may  evade  approaching  death  only  on  con¬ 
dition  that  he  find  a  substitute.  All  refuse  to  assume 
the  sacrifice  until  his  wife  consents.  As  her  strength 
fails  at  the  approach  of  Death,  Heracles  arrives.  His 
host  allows  the  hero  to  remain  in  ignorance  of  the  situa¬ 
tion.  While  jovially  drinking,  the  demi-god  learns 
the  truth,  and  going  to  the  tomb,  wrestles  with  Death 
and  restores  Alcestis  to  her  husband. 

The  Medea  (431  b.c.)  is  perhaps  the  best  known  of 
the  plays  of  Euripides.  Medea,  a  barbarian  princess 
from  Colchis,  has  accompanied  Jason  to  Greece  when 
he  returns  with  his  Argonauts  from  the  successful  quest 
for  the  Golden  Fleece.  This  success  has  been  achieved 
only  through  Medea’s  assistance.  At  Corinth,  Medea 
is  cast  aside  by  Jason,  who  contemplates  the  taking 
of  a  Greek  wife,  the  daughter  of  the  king  of  Corinth. 
Medea  and  her  two  boys  are  to  be  banished.  The  play 
relates  the  terrible  revenge  of  the  deserted  and  passion¬ 
ate  Medea,  who  slays  the  intended  bride  and  her  father 
through  the  medium  of  a  poisoned  robe,  and,  to  punish 
her  recreant  and  selfish  husband,  kills  her  own  children. 

The  Iphigenia  among  the  Taurians  has  always  been 
extremely  popular.  Iphigenia,  daughter  of  Agamem¬ 
non,  supposedly  sacrificed  at  Aulis,  so  that  the  Greek 
fleet  might  have  fair  winds  to  sail  to  Troy,  has  been 
saved  by  Artemis  and  transported  to  the  Crimea,  the 
barbarian  Tauric  land.  Here  she  is  priestess  of 
the  temple,  and  her  dread  duty  is  to  sacrifice  strangers. 


1 


194  GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 

Hither,  at  Apollo’s  instigation  and  in  quest  of  an 
ancient  image  of  Artemis,  come  her  brother,  Orestes, 
pursued  by  the  avenging  Furies  because  of  his  matri¬ 
cide,  and  his  faithful  companion,  Pylades.  Orestes  is 
about  to  be  sacrificed,  when  sister  and  brother  recog¬ 
nize  each  other  and  plan  a  successful  escape. 

The  Trojan  Women  is  a  pathetic  and  moving  pre¬ 
sentation  of  tragic  scenes  following  the  fall  of  Troy. 
The  recent  revival  of  this  war-time  drama  made  a 
powerful  impression  upon  minds  and  hearts  poignantly 
aroused  by  the  tragic  realities  of  the  Great  War. 

The  Tragic  Poets 

The  three  great  Athenian  tragedians  cannnot  be 
carelessly  considered  as  a  unit  as  if  they  typified  a 
single  school.  Although  they  are  all  of  Athens  and  of 
the  fifth  century  b.c.,  and  wrote  for  an  Athenian 
audience  and  theater,  they  differ  widely  in  thought, 
methods,  aims,  and  achievement.  Aeschylus,  first  in 
time,  is  first  in  creative  genius,  and  loftiness  of  poetic 
powers.  Of  the  tragedians  he  is  the  exemplar  of  the 
“  grand  style  ”  or,  as  Longinus,  the  Greek  literary  critic 
designates  it,  “  the  sublime.”  His  plays  abound  in 
sonorous  Miltonic  lines,  in  bold  and  original  epithets 
and  compound  words,  in  striking  figures  of  speech, 
and  in  solemn  and  inspired  lyrics.  His  style  is  ever 
lofty  and  his  verse  dignified.  To  Homer  he  is  greatly 
indebted.  The  characters  in  his  drama  are  gods,  demi¬ 
gods,  or  great  heroes,  and  the  world  in  which  they 
move  and  act  is  not  ours.  In  his  thought  he  is  con¬ 
servative,  and  in  his  religious  views  orthodox.  It  is 
customarily  asserted  that  Hellenism  and  Hebraism  in 
their  religious  conceptions  are  poles  apart.  In  general, 
this  is  true.  Yet  there  is  something  of  the  old  Hebraic 
element  in  the  religious  teachings  of  the  Aeschylean 
dramas  in  their  stern  insistence  on  moral  doctrines, 
such  as  “  the  sinner  must  pay  the  penalty,”  “  he  who 
transgresses  against  Heaven  in  word,  in  thought,  or  in 


GREEK  TRAGEDY 


195 


deed,  will  be  brought  low  by  divine  will,”  “  the  sins  of 
the  fathers  shall  be  visited  upon  their  children,”  and 
“  we  learn  through  suffering.”  Of  great  influence  and 
power,  and  playing  great  roles  in  the  Aeschylean  trag¬ 
edies,  are  Moira,  Necessity,  Ate,  and  Nemesis.  Moira 
is  Fate  personified,  an  agency  which  in  the  beginning 
was  more  powerful  than  the  gods  themselves.  Even 
Zeus,  in  the  Prometheus,  is  thought  of  as  being  sub¬ 
servient  to  Moira,  although  in  the  Agamemnon  the  con¬ 
ception  has  somewhat  changed  and  Fate  is  an  instru¬ 
ment  in  the  hands  of  the  Father  of  gods  and  men,  or 
rather,  Fate  and  Zeus  are  identified.  But  Fate  does 
not  work  blindly  nor  is  man  its  mere  plaything;  Fate 
overwhelms  the  sinner.  Ate  is  the  personification  of 
sin,  a  blind  obsession  which  pursues  the  sinner,  takes 
possession  of  his  mind,  and  accomplishes  his  ruin.  Over¬ 
much  prosperity  may  fill  a  man  with  overweening  pride 
and  wanton  insolence  ( hybris ) ;  Nemesis,  the  personi¬ 
fication  of  divine  retribution,  then  overtakes  him  and 
humbles  him.  As  a  dramatist  Aeschylus  is  a  pioneer 
and  his  plays  are  naturally  simple  in  technique,  and 
plot  and  action  are  not  highly  developed.  One  thinks 
of  Aeschylus,  first,  perhaps,  as  a  moral  and  religious 
teacher,  next  as  a  great  dramatic  poet,  and  lastly,  as 
a  playwright. 

Than  Sophocles  there  is  no  more  attractive  figure  in 
ancient  Athens.  In  the  circumstances  of  his  life  he  was 
happy,  in  his  relations  with  his  fellow-men  he  was  popu¬ 
lar,  and  in  his  chosen  life-work  he  was  successful. 
Sophocles  is  the  embodiment  of  the  Greek  genius;  he 
is  the  personification  of  Greek  good-taste  and  sophro - 
syne,  or  the  golden  mean  in  all  things.  His  predecessor, 
Aeschylus,  had  cleared  the  way.  Sophocles,  of  gentler 
mold,  although  of  lesser  originality,  refined  and  im¬ 
proved  the  dramatic  art.  As  Cicero  boasted  he  had 
done  with  philosophy,  so  Sophocles  brought  tragedy 
“  down  from  the  clouds,”  and  made  it  of  strong  human 
appeal.  His  characters,  unlike  those  of  Aeschylus,  are 
essentially  human  and  arouse  human  sympathies,  yet 


196 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


idealism  dominates  them.  In  delineation  of  character 
he  marks  a  distinct  advance  upon  Aeschylus.  Particu¬ 
larly  in  plot-construction  is  he  a  master ;  in  this  respect 
his  Oedipus  Tyr annus  is  the  greatest  of  all  Greek  plays. 
His  style  is  restrained,  yet  ever  polished.  His  iambic 
verse  is  perfect.  Poetic  inspiration  in  his  dramas,  while 
not  compelling  as  in  Aeschylus,  is  never  bombastic 
in  its  expression,  is  ever  sustained,  and  is  consistently 
maintained  at  a  high  level  of  excellence.  In  the  dia¬ 
logues  and  the  speeches  of  his  plays  he  is  rhetorical  in 
the  good  sense  and  is  never  swept  away  into  bathos ,  as 
is  Euripides  occasionally.  Prominent  and  of  tremen¬ 
dous  effect  in  his  plays  is  the  use  of  tragic  irony.  This 
is  in  evidence  when  a  hero,  unaware  of  his  real  tragic 
situation,  which  is  clear  to  the  audience,  utters  words 
which  he  thinks  refer  to  others  but  which,  in  reality, 
apply  to  himself.  A  moving  example  of  this  effective 
dramatic  device,  this  irony  often  called  “  Sophoclean,” 
is  found  in  the  Ajax ,  when  the  hero  thanks  Athena  for 
her  favors,  although  it  is  she  who  has  betrayed  him. 
The  most  striking  cases  are  in  the  Oedipus  Tyr  annus, 
especially  where  Oedipus  imprecates  curses  upon  the 
head  of  the  murderer  of  Laius,  and  thereby  unwittingly 
pronounces  his  own  doom. 

With  religion  Sophocles  is  not  so  much  concerned 
as  is  Aeschylus.  A  calm  religious  spirit,  however, 
breathes  through  his  plays  and  the  unwritten  laws  of 
Heaven  are  supreme.  He  who  does  them  violence 
suffers  divine  chastisement.  In  general,  in  his  survey 
of  the  universe,  to  use  the  true  and  oft-quoted  criticism 
of  Matthew  Arnold,  “  he  saw  life  steadily  and  saw  it 
whole. ” 

The  virtues  of  the  Athenian  genius  are  to  be  found 
in  the  tragedies  of  Sophocles:  side  by  side  we  find 
simplicity  and  finish,  directness  and  urbanity,  frank¬ 
ness  and  reserve.  Over  all  and  in  all  is  beauty, 
Grecian  beauty,  difficult  truly  to  define  but  conspicuous 
in  Athenian  art  and  literature  at  its  best.  Sophocles 
is  indeed  a  lovable  figure  to  those  who  are  privileged 


GREEK  TRAGEDY  197 

to  know  him  and  thereby  enter  into  the  spirit  of  ancient 
Athens. 

If  Aeschylus  is  to  be  regarded  as  a  religious  and  moral 
teacher  of  great  poetic  and  dramatic  gifts,  and 
Sophocles  as  a  consummate  dramatic  artist  of  deeply 
religious  convictions,  Euripides  is  to  be  characterized 
as  a  master  of  the  theater.  In  his  religious  views  he  is 
often  sceptical,  as  a  poet  he  is  uneven  in  performance, 
but  as  a  writer  of  plays  for  a  real  audience  he  is  seldom 
ineffective.  In  consequence,  although  during  his  life¬ 
time  he  was  far  from  winning  the  dramatic  popularity 
of  Aeschylus  —  of  the  nearly  one  hundred  plays  of 
Euripides  only  four  received  first  prize  —  or  the  per¬ 
sonal  esteem  given  to  Sophocles,  after  his  death  for 
some  centuries  his  plays,  and  not  those  of  his  great 
predecessors,  were  constantly  revived,  annotated,  and 
imitated.  Aeschylus,  with  his  old-time  religious  ortho¬ 
doxy  and  grandeur  of  concept  and  language  “  needs 
interpreters  for  the  many,”  as  Pindar  says  of  his  own 
odes;  Sophocles  is  the  embodiment  of  the  Attic  genius 
of  the  Age  of  Pericles;  Euripides,  however,  is  an  apostle 
of  unrest  and  of  a  world  in  ferment  and  change.  Pas¬ 
sion,  conflict,  and  strong  emotion  blaze  up  in  his  plays. 

Roman  tragedy  as  it  has  come  down  to  us  in  the 
plays  of  Seneca  is  largely  Euripides.  The  Euripidean 
influence  on  French  drama  through  the  medium  of 
Seneca  has  been  enormous.  Today,  for  popular  reading 
and  presentation  the  dramas  of  Euripides  are  the  Greek 
plays  chosen.  Why  is  this?  Many  reasons  are  ap¬ 
parent.  In  comparison  with  Aeschylus,  the  creative 
artist,  and  Sophocles,  the  idealist,  Euripides  is  ever 
“  modern,”  for  fie  is  theatrical  in  his  technique  as  a 
playwright,  and  a  realist  in  his  thinking,  handling,  and 
presentation  of  dramatic  material.  There  is  much 
truth  in  the  familiar  saying  of  Sophocles,  quoted  by 
Aristotle:  “  I  paint  men  as  they  should  be,  Euripides 
as  they  are.” 

Many  of  the  plays  of  Euripides  show  his  great 
ability  to  delineate  character,  as,  for  example,  the 


198 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Medea;  they  reveal  originality  in  construction  of  plot 
and  ingenuity  of  innovation  in  handling  the  old  themes, 
as  in  the  Iphigenia  among  the  Taurians.  In  poetic 
merit  his  work  is  singularly  uneven;  lyric  passages  of 
haunting  beauty  may  alternate  with  banal  speeches  and 
dialogue  which  is  frigidly  rhetorical.  The  influence  of 
his  teachers,  the  physicist-philosopher  Anaxagoras,  and 
the  popular  Sophists  of  the  day,  is  seen  in  his  writings. 
For  Euripides  the  myths,  the  stories  of  the  gods,  the 
dogmas  of  old-time,  even  the  gods  themselves  are  no 
longer  credible  and  sacred  and  must  be  weighed  in  the 
balance  and  even  rejected.  By  him,  conventions  were 
to  be  disregarded.  As  had  been  said,  it  was  his  choice 
“  to  put  new  wine  into  old  bottles/’  and  this  made  him 
anathema  to  conservatives,  such  as  the  comic  poet 
Aristophanes,  but  it  endeared  him  to  the  younger  gen¬ 
eration,  the  disciples  of  the  “  new  thought.” 

It  is  strange  that  Euripides  should  have  been  re¬ 
garded  through  the  centuries  as  a  woman-hater  —  a 
dramatist  who  so  strongly  championed  woman’s  rights, 
as  in  the  Medea ,  and  revealed  so  nobly  a  woman’s  self- 
sacrifice,  as  in  the  Alcestis.  This  erroneous  conception 
of  the  tragedian  is  probably  based  on  his  own  suppos¬ 
edly  unhappy  domestic  life  and  on  the  fact  that  evil 
women  as  well  as  noble  are  presented  in  his  plays. 

The  virtues  of  Euripides  are  numerous,  evident,  and 
have  ever  been  admired.  It  is  because  of  them  that  he 
is  the  most  popular  of  the  Athenian  tragedians.  But 
from  his  own  day  to  the  present  time  he  has  been 
severely  criticized  for  grievous  faults  and  blemishes. 
Some  of  these  have  been  indicated  and  briefly  dis¬ 
cussed  above.  Aristophanes,  in  the  Clouds ,  abuses  the 
dramatist  for  his  ideas,  supposedly  heterodox,  on  re¬ 
ligion,  morality,  and  education;  but  in  these  views 
Euripides  is  but  representative  of  the  changing  ideas  of 
the  times,  the  “  new  school  ”  of  thinking.  Nor  are  we 
perturbed  by  the  charges  of  the  comic  poet  that 
Euripides  is  culpable  in  introducing  mean  characters 
and  trivial  incidents  into  his  plays,  and  that  his  inno- 


GREEK  TRAGEDY 


199 


vations  in  music  and  in  meter  are  reprehensible.  Aris¬ 
tophanes  further  alleges  that  Euripides’  prologues  are 
monotonous  and  mechanical,  and  Aristotle  reprehends 
him  for  inconsistency,  for  faultiness  in  management  of 
his  subjects,  and  for  his  misuse  of  the  deus  ex  machina . 

To  answer  these  numerous  charges  briefly  we  may 
say  that  Euripides  was  a  master  of  the  theater  and 
knew  his  audience.  The  special  prologues  to  his  plays 
doubtless  met  with  popular  favor,  as  did  the  prologue 
common  to  the  Elizabethan  drama.  The  Euripidean 
prologues  do  not,  as  it  has  been  frequently  asserted, 
kill  interest  in  the  stories  to  follow.  As  Professor  D. 
C.  Stuart  has  shown,  they  do  not  tell  the  plot  in  detail, 
but  serve  to  create  suspense  by  foreshadowing  possible 
dread  happenings.  In  regard  to  Euripides’  use  of  the 
deus  ex  machina ,  it  may  be  said  that  this  device  of  in¬ 
troducing  a  deity  at  a  critical  moment  must  have  been 
extremely  effective  to  an  Athenian  audience.  Reli¬ 
giously,  the  epiphany,  or  envisagement  of  the  god,  was 
awe-inspiring  in  highest  measure ;  theatrically,  the 
effect  must  have  been  thrilling.  Not  through  poverty 
of  invention,  it  is  certain,  did  Euripides  employ  this 
artifice;  it  was  rather  through  his  sure  theatric  instinct. 
In  a  late  play,  the  Philoctetes,  we  see  Sophocles  paying 
Euripides  the  great  compliment  of  imitation  in  this 
matter. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

THE  CHARACTERISTICS  OF  ATTIC  TRAGEDY 


OWHERE  is  the  genius  of  the  Athenians  more 


strikingly  manifest  than  in  the  tragedies  they 
wrote  and  produced.  These  dramas  are  per¬ 


manent  contributions  to  culture  and  of  eternal  interest 
because  they  are  appealing  as  plays,  they  are  great  as 
literature,  and  they  are  true  as  an  interpretation  and 
criticism  of  life.  In  this  chapter  we  shall  consider  some 
of  the  chief  characteristics  of  Attic  tragedy. 

Extremely  striking  is  the  literary  quality  of  all  the 
extant  dramas  of  the  three  great  tragedians.  The 
thought  was  ever  clothed  in  suitable  language,  exempli¬ 
fying  Aristotle’s  definition  when  he  says  in  the  Poetics 
that  “  Tragedy  is  an  imitation  of  an  action  that  is  seri¬ 
ous,  complete,  and  of  a  certain  magnitude,  in  language 
embellished  with  each  kind  of  artistic  ornament.”  The 
Athenian  drama  was  exclusively  poetic  drama.  The 
verse  form  was  employed  throughout,  the  iambic  tri¬ 
meter  for  the  dialogue  and  speeches  of  the  actors,  and 
freg  meters  for  the  lyrics  of  the  chorus.  As  is  the  case 
with  the  plays  of  Shakespeare,  therefore,  Greek  trage¬ 
dies  may  be  read  with  enjoyment  as  literature,  for  they 
are  noble  as  poetry. 

It  is  not  enough,  however,  that  a  play  be  expressed  in 
beautiful  language;  it  must  be  dramatic.  The  first 
essential  of  a  drama  is,  that  it  shall  interest,  impress, 
and  satisfy  an  audience  in  the  theater  and  not  that  it 
shall  please  a  reader  in  his  study.  Shelley’s  Prometheus 
Unbound,  Swinburne’s  Atalanta  in  Calydon,  and  Mat¬ 
thew  Arnold’s  Merope  are  fine  poems,  but  poor  plays. 
Granting  that  the  tragedies  of  Athens  are  excellent 
poetry  and  that  they  possess  literary  artistry  of  style 


200 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  ATTIC  TRAGEDY  201 


and  symmetry  of  form,  do  they  meet  the  inexorable 
test  of  the  theater?  This  question  may  be  truthfully 
and  emphatically  answered  in  the  affirmative,  but  at 
the  same  time  the  answer  demands  elucidation. 

One  who  tries  to  understand  and  interpret  a  play  and 
to  judge  of  its  dramatic  qualities  and  effectiveness 
must  take  into  consideration  several  fundamental  fac¬ 
tors  —  the  time  and  place  of  the  production  of  the 
drama,  why  it  was  written  by  the  playwright,  the  na¬ 
ture  of  his  theater,  and  the  character  and  sophistication 
of  the  audience  before  whom  it  was  produced.  A 
facetious  reviewer  of  a  recent  book  on  the  Greek 
theater  remarked  that  the  author  had  discussed  at 
length  various  topics,  but  had  remained  silent  on  the 
most  important  subject  of  all,  whether  ancient  Greek 
audiences  were  not  really  bored  by  ancient  Greek  plays. 
Now  every  student  of  ancient  Greek  life  knows  the 
eagerness,  curiosity,  and  interest  of  the  Greek  audience, 
and  understands  what  meaning,  value,  and  influence 
Greek  drama  had  for  the  people  themselves.  To  the 
Athenians  the  plays  as  given  during  the  festivals  were 
at  once  entertainment,  literature,  moral  and  ethical 
instruction,  and  religious  worship.  Every  community 
had  its  theater  and  the  plays  presented  in  these  theaters 
were  written  for  hearers  and  spectators  and  were  not 
intended  for  readers,  since  a  reading  public  in  those 
days  scarcely  existed.  Few  of  the  contemporaries  of 
the  dramatists  would  read  their  dramas,  but  nearly  all 
would  hear  and  see  them.  And  the  plays  produced 
were  the  best  only,  chosen  in  keen  competition  during 
the  glorious  days  of  the  fifth  century  or  revived  in 
later  times  because  of  their  proved  excellence. 

But  do  these  plays  interest  a  modern  audience  when 
they  are  presented  today?  Again  it  must  be  said  by 
way  of  proviso  that  the  conditions  underlying  the  writ¬ 
ing  and  the  production  of  a  Greek  tragedy  are  very 
different  from  those  obtaining  today.  The  Greek 
drama  was  essentially  religious  in  origin  and  always 
remained  as  the  culmination  of  the  celebration  of  a 


202 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


religious  festival,  whereas  modern  drama,  originally 
religious,  has  become  thoroughly  secular.  The  Greek 
dramatist  was  regarded  primarily  as  a  teacher;  the 
modern  is  first  and  foremost  an  entertainer.  To  the 
cultivated  Athenians  the  plays  were  literature;  in  the 
strictly  modern  drama  literary  quality  is  more  likely 
to  be  a  handicap  than  a  help  and  an  esteemed  virtue. 
But  it  may  be  emphatically  said  that  Athenian  trage¬ 
dies  do  greatly  interest  modern  audiences  when  the 
play  is  judiciously  chosen,  sympathetically  presented, 
intelligently  acted,  and  the  audience  itself  is  cultivated. 
To  be  sure  it  cannot  be  expected  that  all  the  Greek 
plays,  differing  widely  one  from  another  as  they  do, 
and  originating  among  a  people  living  over  twenty- 
three  hundred  years  ago,  amid  conditions  so  different 
from  the  world  of  today  should  make  equal  appeal  to 
modern  taste  and  feeling.  For  example,  the  Ajax  of 
Sophocles  was  a  thrilling  play  to  the  Greek  audience 
and  held  their  interest  to  the  very  end  because  the 
question  at  issue,  all  important  to  Greek  religious  feel¬ 
ing,  is  this — Shall  the  dead  hero  receive  religious  burial 
or  not?  To  us,  however,  it  may  seem  that  the  high 
point  of  interest  is  reached  in  the  middle  of  the  play 
when  Ajax  slays  himself.  Again,  a  modern  audience 
might  not  relish  particularly  the  long  prophetic  recital 
in  the  Prometheus  of  Aeschylus  where  the  tortured 
Titan  describes  to  the  wandering  and  persecuted  Io  her 
future  peregrinations.  It  is  possible  that  this  detailed 
passage  would  seem  to  many  in  an  audience  today  an 
impertinent  interpolation,  but  to  the  Athenian  auditors 
of  the  fifth  century  b.c.  the  geographical,  ethnological, 
and  mythological  allusions  in  the  recital  were  unques¬ 
tionably  of  engrossing  interest.  But  the  numerous  and 
intelligent  presentations  in  recent  years  of  certain 
Greek  plays  have  evoked  genuine  interest  and  admira¬ 
tion.  The  pathos  of  the  Trojan  Women  of  Euripides, 
unhappy  victims  of  war,  is  profoundly  moving;  the 
scene  in  the  Iphigenia  among  the  Taurians,  where  a 
dramatic  recognition  at  a  critical  moment  saves  Orestes 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  ATTIC  TRAGEDY  203 


from  sacrifice  by  his  sister’s  hand,  still  has  power  to 
arouse  keen  suspense;  the  Iphigenia  at  Aulis  in  many 
scenes  is  thoroughly  modern;  the  Electra  of  Sophocles 
holds  spell-bound  an  audience  today;  and  the  Oedipus 
Tyr annus  of  Sophocles,  in  its  marvelous  technical 
handling  of  a  difficult  plot,  splendid  delineation  of 
character,  and  successful  working  out  of  all  the  essen¬ 
tial  dramatic  values  is,  in  the  opinion  of  many  com¬ 
petent  and  unprejudiced  critics,  the  greatest  play  ever 
written. 

The  absence  of  the  love  element  in  most  Greek  plays 
tends  to  render  them  somewhat  alien  to  modern  taste. 
In  perhaps  nine-tenths  of  modern  plays  the  motive  of 
romantic  love  between  the  sexes  is  the  very  essence  of 
their  structure  and  being.  While  the  motive  of  love  is 
often  found  in  one  form  or  another  in  Greek  New 
Comedy,  it  is  rare  in  Athenian  tragedy.  It  is  true  that 
in  the  Antigone  of  Sophocles  the  love  of  the  affianced 
pair,  Antigone  and  Haemon,  intensifies  the  pathos  of 
the  tragic  denouement,  yet  the  love  element  is  not 
stressed  as  it  would  be  in  a  modern  play.  The  Greek 
dramatist  allows  nothing  to  distract  the  attention  from 
the  great  issue  of  the  play,  the  conflict  between  the 
eternal  and  wise  laws  of  Heaven,  venerated  and  obeyed 
by  the  heroine,  and  the  foolish  edicts  of  the  State  as 
promulgated  by  the  stubborn  and  short-sighted  Creon. 
The  Trachinian  Women  of  Sophocles  is  remarkable  for 
the  revelation  in  many  ways  of  the  tender  affection  of 
Deianira  for  her  absent  husband,  Heracles,  whose  doom 
she  innocently  brings  to  pass  by  the  gift  of  the  fatal 
love-token.  Yet  it  is  the  fortunes  of  the  great  hero 
that  are  all  important  in  the  play.  Love,  too,  plays 
a  part  in  the  life  and  fate  of  characters  in  the  Hippoly- 
tus ,  Medea ,  and  Alcestis  of  Euripides,  but  in  general 
Greek  tragedy  is  based  on  other  themes. 

Greek  and  modern  tragedies  differ,  too,  in  this  re¬ 
spect  that  the  Athenian  dramatists  were  limited  by 
tradition  and  by  conservative  religious  feeling  to  the 
portrayal  of  old  stories.  Homer  and  the  Cyclic  poets, 


204 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Hesiod,  and  the  “  epic-lyric  ”  poet  Stesichorus  furnish 
most  of  the  plots.  Phrynichus  had  attempted  to  break 
away  from  this  custom  by  a  tragedy  based  on  the  cap¬ 
ture  of  the  Ionian  city  Miletus  by  the  Persians  in  494 
b.c.  But  the  Athenian  people,  distressed  by  witnessing 
this  presentation  of  the  sorrows  of  an  allied  and  re¬ 
lated  people,  and  reminded,  doubtless,  of  their  own 
derelictions,  fined  the  dramatist  one  thousand  drachmas 
and  forbade  further  performances  of  that  play. 
Aeschylus  wrote  of  a  contemporary  event  in  his 
Persians ,  but  this  gave  no  offense  to  his  fellow-citizens 
as  the  play  relates  the  downfall  of  the  hated  enemy 
and  the  Athenian  victory  at  Salamis.  These  examples, 
however,  were  not  generally  followed  and  the  cycles  of 
mythical  tales  gathered  about  Troy,  Thebes,  and  Argos 
were  the  inexhaustible  quarry  from  which  all  three  of 
the  great  tragedians  obtained  their  material.  The  same 
story  might  be  used  by  all  three  playwrights.  For  ex¬ 
ample,  all  three  dramatists  base  tragedies  on  the  un¬ 
happy  plight  of  Electra.  Yet  this  use  of  old  and 
familiar  material  was  not  a  handicap  to  them  and  their 
art.  Variations  in  details  and  masterly  handling  of 
character  and  situation  enabled  them  to  avoid  monot¬ 
ony  and  sustain  dramatic  interest.  The  audience  could 
not  hear  too  often  the  familiar,  but  ever  new,  stories. 
As  we  know  so  well  from  Shakespeare,  familiarity  does 
not  detract  from  our  enjoyment  of  his  plays.  On  the 
contrary  familiarity  may  enhance  our  pleasure,  pro¬ 
vided  that  the  play  is  genuinely  great  in  the  true 
dramatic  qualities,  such  as  construction  of  plot,  delinea¬ 
tion  of  character,  inevitability  of  consequence,  and  the 
arousing  of  suspense. 

To  some  modern  readers  of  the  Greek  drama  the 
presence  and  participation  of  the  Chorus  is  a  stumbling- 
block  to  full  appreciation.  The  introduction  of  choral 
lyrics  at  frequent  intervals  seems  to  impede  the  swift 
action  of  the  play  and  to  cause  cooling  of  interest  in 
the  unfolding  of  the  story.  It  must,  however,  be  re¬ 
membered  that  Greek  tragedy  was  merely  a  develop- 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  ATTIC  TRAGEDY  205 


ment  of  the  dithyramb,  the  Doric  choral  lyric  sung  and 
danced  by  a  chorus  of  fifty  in  honor  of  Dionysus.  The 
song  and  dance,  of  religious  origin  and  meaning,  was 
the  very  essence  of  the  play.  To  a  Greek,  tragedy 
would  have  been  unthinkable  without  the  singing,  danc¬ 
ing,  and  interpretation  of  the  Chorus.  While  it  is  true 
that  the  history  of  Greek  tragedy  shows  a  gradual 
decline  in  the  participation  and  the  importance  of  the 
Chorus  as  an  active  and  indispensable  factor,  from  our 
earliest  extant  play,  the  Suppliants  of  Aeschylus  —  a 
drama  mostly  lyric  with  the  Chorus  the  chief  actor  — 
to  the  later  plays  of  Euripides  —  where  the  choral 
element  is  comparatively  insignificant  so  far  as  dra¬ 
matic  action  is  concerned  —  yet  religious  feeling  and 
conservatism  forbade  its  total  omission  even  though 
plot,  action,  and  characters  became  gradually  para¬ 
mount.  To  the  Athenian  audience  the  Chorus  was  felt 
to  be  both  actor  and  audience.  In  the  early  plays,  as  in 
those  of  Aeschylus,  the  songs  of  the  chorus  actually 
served  to  further  the  plot;  excise  the  lyrics  and  the  ac¬ 
tion  would  be  scarcely  intelligible,  as  in  the  Agamem¬ 
non.  Through  the  coryphaeus,  or  leader,  the  Chorus 
might,  and  did,  participate  in  the  dialogue.  Always  an 
interested  spectator,  the  Chorus  served  not  merely  as 
a  sympathetic  background  for  the  action,  but  expressed, 
or  actually  created,  the  mood  at  any  given  moment  of 
the  audience.  The  choral  lyrics  eased  the  emotional 
shock  at  the  moment  of  the  peripety  (the  reversal  of 
fortune)  or  gave  voice  to  the  general  exultation  at  the 
announcement  of  glad  news.  Suspense  might  be 
heightened  by  the  expression  of  the  Chorus’  fears  and 
forebodings.  Lyric  prayers  for  help  and  songs  of 
thanksgiving  are  frequent.  Especially  important  is  the 
Chorus  in  Aeschylus  which  he  used  as  the  instrument 
of  profound  religious  expression.  As  has  been  said, 
the  Greek  tragedian  was  primarily  a  moral  teacher ;  the 
Chorus  was  a  powerful  medium  for  religious  instruc¬ 
tion. 

In  general,  when  the  chief  character  is  a  woman,  the 


206 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Chorus  is  composed  of  women,  as,  for  example,  in  the 
Iphigenia  among  the  Taurians,  whereas  a  Chorus  of 
men  usually  serves  as  support  for  a  male  protagonist. 
Yet  there  are  noteworthy  exceptions  whereby  the  effect 
of  the  play  is  greatly  enhanced,  e.g.,  the  rugged  Prome¬ 
theus,  surrounded  by  the  gentle  maidens,  the  daughters 
of  Oceanus,  and  Antigone,  in  striking  isolation,  with  a 
background  of  stern  Theban  elders. 

Modern  critics  of  the  Chorus  in  the  Greek  drama, 
and  apologists  also,  fail  lamentably  to  do  justice  to  their 
theme  insofar  as  they  forget  that  it  was  a  highly  im¬ 
portant  function  of  the  Chorus  to  enhance  the  dramatic 
picture.  One  of  the  great  elements  in  dramatic  art 
is  spectacle,  and  this  was  provided  richly  by  the  Chorus. 
Recall,  for  instance,  the  opening  scene  of  the  Eumen- 
ides,  where  the  Chorus  of  grim  Furies,  who  surround 
their  exhausted  quarry,  the  unhappy  Orestes,  lie  sleep¬ 
ing.  Greek  tragedy  is  replete  with  these  stage-pictures 
which  must  have  been  always  theatrically  effective  and 
frequently  beautiful.  In  the  Greek  open-air  theater 
the  lighting  naturally  could  not  be  changed,  and  a 
change  of  scene  in  tragedy  was  rare.  But  by  way  of 
compensation  for  the  lack  of  lighting  and  of  elaborate 
scenery  —  theatrical  accessories  so  dear  to  the  modern 
theater-goer  —  the  costumed  chorus  gave  pleasure  to 
the  eye.  The  modern  reader  of  the  plays  fails  to  realize 
the  dramatic  beauty  and  impressive  dignity  of  Greek 
tragedy.  The  esthetic  value  and  the  emotional  effect 
of  a  Greek  play  as  a  picture  is  largely  lost  to  us,  un¬ 
less  we  can,  in  imagination,  conjure  forth  the  accom¬ 
panying  elements  of  the  dramatic  representation  —  the 
occasion  itself  of  the  production  as  part  of  the  sacred 
annual  festival,  the  religious  atmosphere,  the  music  of 
the  flute,  the  voices  of  the  singers,  and  the  evolutions 
and  grouping  of  the  dancers.  The  spectators,  seated 
on  the  slope  of  a  hillside  in  the  warmth  of  a  spring 
sun,  surrounded  by  a  beautiful  landscape,  watched 
with  profound  and  changing  emotions  the  unfolding  of 
the  drama. 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  ATTIC  TRAGEDY  207 


Attempts  have  been  made  to  compare  the  Greek 
tragedies  with  modern  opera,  as,  for  example,  the  music- 
dramas  of  Richard  Wagner.  It  is  true  that  there  are 
resemblances,  and  the  results  of  these  studies  are 
valuable.  Yet  in  modern  opera  the  musical  element  is 
paramount,  whereas  this  was  not  the  case  in  the  Greek 
drama.  The  Wagnerian  orchestra  is  a  rich  and  power¬ 
ful  instrument  frequently  dominating  lyric  recitation 
and  dramatic  action.  In  the  Greek  plays  only  the 
slender  notes  of  a  single  flute  accentuated  the  rhythm 
of  the  dancers’  steps  and  evolutions  and  provided  lyric 
accompaniment  for  the  clear  enunciation  of  the  odes 
sung  in  unison,  songs  which,  unlike  modern  operatic 
and  choral  singing,  could  be  completely  understood  by 
all  in  the  audience. 

It  is  interesting  to  observe  that  the  Greeks  drew  a 
•  sharp  distinction  in  dramatic  composition  between 
tragedy  and  comedy.  No  Athenian  writer  of  tragedies 
wrote  comedies  and  no  comedian  essayed  tragedy  al¬ 
though  the  versatile  Ion  of  Chios  is  said  to  have  been 
an  exception.  How  different  this  is  from  modern 
drama!  Shakespeare,  for  example,  was  a  master  in 
both  provinces,  and  united  the  types,  as,  for  example, 
in  Measure  for  Measure,  technically  a  comedy,  yet 
generally  serious  in  tone.  There  is  to  be  seen, 
however,  a  growing  tendency  in  Greek  tragedy  to 
erase  the  sharp  dividing  line  between  tragedy  and 
comedy.  Even  in  Aeschylus  and  Sophocles  there 
are  occasional  flashes  of  humor  and  comic  touches 
in  the  scenes  in  which  rustic  shepherds  or  mes¬ 
sengers  appear,  while  Euripides,  in  such  plays  as 
the  Iphigenia  among  the  Taurians  and  the  Alcestis, 
which  are  not  tragedies  in  the  Shakespearian  sense,  as 
they  have  scenes  almost  comic,  and  happy  endings, 
paved  the  way  for  Greek  New  Comedy.  These  Euripi- 
dean  tragi-comedies,  however,  are  real  tragedies  in 
the  Aristotelian  sense,  and  illustrate  his  definition  that 
“  a  tragedy  is  an  artistic  imitation  of  an  action  that 
is  serious,  complete  in  itself,  and  of  an  adequate  magni- 


208 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


tude.”  These  plays,  morever,  have  throughout  the 
potentialities  of  tragedy  according  to  the  modern 
definition  of  the  term. 

It  seems  appropriate  at  this  point  to  consider  cer¬ 
tain  pronouncements  of  modern  criticism  that  have  as 
their  aim  a  sharp  and  convenient  differentiation  of 
Greek  and  modern  tragedy.  First,  the  dictum  that  the 
Greek  drama  is  one  of  inaction,  the  modern  of  action. 
There  is  enough  of  truth  in  this  categorical  statement 
to  make  its  enunciation  intelligible.  The  Prometheus 
Bound  of  Aeschylus,  for  example,  taken  as  a  single 
play  —  although  it  should  not  be  forgotten  that  the 
Prometheus  is  doubtless  only  one  of  three  plays,  or 
acts,  in  a  trilogy  —  has  little  plot  and  action:  it  con¬ 
sists  largely  of  a  masterly  and  poetic  portrayal  of  the 
character  of  the  Titan  rebel  as  he  rages  against  what 
he  considers  to  be  his  cruel,  humiliating,  and  unde¬ 
served  punishment  at  the  hands  of  an  ungrateful  Zeus. 
Now  the  Prometheus  would  probably  not  interest 
greatly  a  modern  audience  accustomed  and  eager  for 
action,  more  action,  and  still  more  action.  Yet  is  there 
not  splendid  plot  and  an  abundance  of  action  with  con¬ 
sequent  “  pity  and  fear  ”  in  such  plays  as  Oedipus 
Tyr annus  and  Antigone  of  Sophocles,  and  in  the 
Medea  and  Iphigenia  among  the  Taurians  of  Euri¬ 
pides?  A  consideration  of  Greek  tragedy  as  a  whole 
will  show  that  too  much  emphasis  has  been  placed  on 
the  supposed  absence  of  action  therein.  The  general¬ 
ization,  superficially  attractive  and  true,  needs  strong 
qualification. 

In  an  excellent  lecture  on  Greek  tragedy  Professor 
J.  R.  Wheeler  says:  “  Greek  drama  is  a  drama  of  ideas; 
the  modern  of  character.  Call  to  mind  the  characters 
of  Antigone,  Orestes,  and  Oedipus  and  we  think  of 
their  tragic  situations  in  which  they  found  themselves 
and  their  woeful  circumstances;  call  Hamlet  to  mind, 
and  his  tragedy  lies  within  his  own  nature.”  Is  this 
wholly  true?  By  no  means,  as  it  seems  to  me,  although 
the  whole  tendency  of  Greek  literature  is  towards 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  ATTIC  TRAGEDY  209 


simplicity  and  objective  handling  and  direct  descrip¬ 
tion  of  subjects,  whereas  the  modern  taste  is  inclined 
to  subjective  analysis  and  detailed  and  psychological 
introspection.  But  Antigone  as  portrayed  by  Sophocles 
stands  forth  as  a  vivid  and  vigorous  personality;  she 
is  no  mere  victim,  helpless  and  colorless,  caught  in  the 
meshes  of  an  inexorable  net,  but  a  forceful  character, 
fighting  for  the  right  as  she  sees  it,  making  her  own 
decision  as  to  action  and  willing  to  abide  by  the  con¬ 
sequences.  Orestes,  as  depicted  in  Sophocles’  Electray 
abetted  by  his  sister,  in  contrast  to  Hamlet,  carries 
through  his  plan  to  avenge  his  father  and  slays  the 
murderers.  If  one  familiar  with  the  Sophoclean  play 
calls  to  mind  Oedipus,  he  thinks  not  merely  of  the 
tragic  situation  of  the  hero,  but  of  his  kindly  although 
impetuous  nature  and  his  noble  mind  but  over-hasty 
conclusions  and  utterance.  One  thinks  of  him  at  the 
beginning  of  the  play  as  the  wise  and  paternal  ruler; 
then,  in  the  scenes  with  Tiresias  and  Creon,  as  haughty, 
suspicious,  and  wrathful;  finally,  one  recalls  his  horror, 
grief,  and  resignation  at  the  end. 

It  is  true  that  Hamlet  furnishes  a  character  study 
such  as  no  personage  of  Greek  —  or  any  other  —  trag¬ 
edy  presents,  yet,  as  one  recalls  Medea,  Jason,  Prome¬ 
theus,  and  Deianira,  circumstances  do  not  stand  forth 
more  prominently  than  the  motivation  of  their  acts 
and  the  inner  meaning  and  outward  expression  of  their 
personal  characters. 

The  element  of  Fate,  called  by  many  names,  is  im¬ 
portant  alike  in  ancient  and  modern  drama.  It  is 
popularly  thought  that  Fate  is  the  be-all  and  end-all  of 
Attic  tragedy.  One  might  assert,  doubtless  with 
little  fear  of  contradiction,  that  the  characters  in  the 
Greek  drama  are  but  helpless  puppets,  themselves  and 
their  acts  and  circumstances  completely  predestined. 
This  current  misconception  of  the  nature  of  the  Greek 
drama  accounts  in  a  measure  for  the  dogmatic  and  un¬ 
qualified  assertion  that  Greek  tragedy  is  a  drama  of 


210 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


ideas,  of  situations,  and  of  woeful  circumstances,  and 
that  it  is  quite  lacking  in  character  portrayal. 

In  this  general  conception  of  Fate  as  a  powerful  fac¬ 
tor  in  the  Greek  drama  there  is,  to  be  sure,  much  truth. 
Particularly  is  this  the  case  in  Aeschylus,  in  whose  plays 
Moira  (Fate)  is  at  times  all  powerful;  indeed,  in  the 
Prometheus ,  Fate  is  conceived  as  being  superior  to 
Zeus  himself.  But  especially  in  Sophocles  and  Eurip¬ 
ides,  what  men  do  themselves,  and  of  themselves,  is 
of  the  greatest  influence  upon  the  outcome.  The  ele¬ 
ment  of  human  volition,  of  character  swayed  by  emo¬ 
tion,  and  the  part  they  play  in  the  Greek  drama  must 
not  be  ignored,  although  it  is  not  always  easy  to  sepa¬ 
rate  the  twisted  strands  of  apparently  foreordained 
happenings  from  those  calamities  which  are  the  result 
of  human  weakness,  frailty,  or  error.  Here  we  have 
Fate  and  character  largely  the  same  thing,  although 
called  by  different  names. 

What  is  the  connection,  or  relation,  between  modern 
and  ancient  tragedy?  Some  rashly  say  there  is  none. 
Is  there  a  close  tie,  whether  of  descent  or  of  kindred 
aims  and  characteristics?  While  direct  and  pure  de¬ 
scent  from  the  Greek  drama  is  not  easily  proved  in  all 
respects  for  modern  tragedy  with  its  religious  origins, 
yet  the  Elizabethan  drama  was  strongly  influenced 
through  the  study  of  Greek  tragedy  by  the  playwrights 
of  that  period.  Profound,  indeed,  has  been  the  influ¬ 
ence  of  the  plays  of  the  Roman  tragedian  Seneca  upon 
the  modern  drama,  and  Seneca,  without  Euripides,  is 
unthinkable.  Ibsen,  for  example,  has  been  justly  called 
the  modern  Euripides.  Truly,  to  conceive  of  the 
modern  drama  without  the  works  of  the  Greek  theater 
is  impossible. 

But  comparisons,  often  odious,  are  generally  difficult 
and  inaccurate.  All  Greek  tragedies  are  by  no  means  of 
one  pattern.  It  is  impossible  to  make  a  safe  and  un¬ 
qualified  generalization  with  respect  to  a  dramatic  liter¬ 
ature  which  includes  the  Suppliants  of  Aeschylus  and 
the  Medea  of  Euripides.  And  modern  plays,  whether 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  ATTIC  TRAGEDY  211 


Shakespearian  or  of  more  recent  date,  by  no  means 
follow  one  set  form.  But  common  to  all  great  trag¬ 
edies  are  certain  powerful,  omnipresent,  and  eter¬ 
nal  elements.  These  are  the  clash  of  wills,  the  unfold¬ 
ing  of  an  inevitable  sequence  of  cause  and  effect,  the 
delineation  and  development  of  character,  the  portrayal 
of  a  sympathetic  personality,  the  arousing  and  holding 
of  suspense,  the  appeal  to  the  emotions,  and  the  revela¬ 
tion  of  good  and  evil  —  not  misery,  for,  as  Aristotle 
says,  “  Tragedy  is  a  drama  or  representation  of  good¬ 
ness  and  nobility,  not  of  misery.”  And  this  revelation 
and  interpretation  of  human  life  with  its  strivings,  vic¬ 
tories,  and  defeats  must,  in  a  play  which  may  properly 
be  called  classic , — i.e.,  a  play  which  will  be  of  universal 
and  eternal  appeal,  as  the  drama  of  a  Shakespeare  or 
of  a  Sophocles,  be  presented  with  dignity  and  with 
power,  in  suitable  form  and  in  beautiful  language  and 
with  a  logical  sequence  of  events.  Above  all  such  a 
play,  to  be  successful,  must  be  genuinely  dramatic,  with 
a  potent  appeal  to  the  minds  and  hearts  of  the  audience. 


CHAPTER  XV 

ATHENIAN  COMEDY 


OMEDY  flourished  by  the  side  of  tragedy,  al¬ 


though  it  reached  its  full  development  some- 


what  later  than  the  tragic  art.  The  City 
Dionysia  as  an  official  festival  had  been  instituted  by 
Pisistratus  with  contests  in  tragedy,  whereas  comedy 
was  not  officially  supervised  in  Athens  until  486  b.c. 
at  the  City  Dionysia,  and  about  442  b.c.  at  the  Lenaea. 

As  was  the  case  with  tragedy,  comedy  originated 
among  the  Dorians  and  in  connection  with  the  wor¬ 
ship  of  the  god  Dionysus.  The  germ  of  comedy  seems 
to  be  found  in  the  revels  of  rustic  festivals  when  the 
god  of  wine  and  fertility  was  worshipped  by  a  joyous 
band  of  dancers  in  fantastic  costume,  singing  im¬ 
promptu  wanton  songs  to  the  accompaniment  of  the 
flute,  and  often  wearing  the  phallus  or  sign  of  fertility. 
Such  a  revel  was  called  a  comus;  the  Greek  word 
comodos  means  revel-singer.  Old  Attic  comedy  seems 
to  have  developed  from  this  primitive  comus  when 
actors  were  added  to  the  chorus,  and  when,  according 
to  literary  tradition,  Epicharmus  of  Sicily  clothed  the 
primitive  ceremony  in  literary  dress  and  gave  it  plot. 

The  structure  of  Old  Comedy  is  similar  to  that  of 
tragedy,  but  with  certain  additional  features.  As  in 
tragedy,  there  is  the  introductory  part  of  the  play,  the 
prologue  which  preceded  the  entrance  song  ( parodus ) 
of  the  chorus,  and  there  are  episodes  alternating  with 
choral  lyrics.  Peculiar  to  comedy,  however,  are  the 
agon,  and  the  parabasis ,  The  agon  is  a  “  dramatized 
debate  ”  —  a  scene  in  which  two  actors,  each  aided  by 
a  semi-chorus  (comedy  had  a  chorus  of  twenty-four), 


212 


ATHENIAN  COMEDY 


213 


engaged  in  a  heated  verbal  contest  sometimes  accompa¬ 
nied  by  blows.  The  parabasis,  or  coming  forward  by  the 
chorus,  was  a  lyric  of  complicated  structure,  following 
a  set  metrical  form,  in  which  the  chorus  as  the  mouth¬ 
piece  of  the  poet,  directly  addressed  the  audience. 

The  course  of  Greek  comedy  can  be  divided  into 
three  periods:  Old  Comedy  to  ca.  390  b.c.;  Middle 
Comedy,  ca.  390-330  b.c.,  and  New  Comedy,  after  330 
b,c.  The  Old  Comedy,  represented  by  Aristophanes, 
and  New  Comedy,  exemplified  by  Menander,  are 
sharply  differentiated  in  their  nature  and  purpose;  the 
Middle  is  a  period  of  transition  and  no  plays  of  this 
class  are  extant. 

Athenian  Old  Comedy  is  characterized  by  personal 
and  political  satire  and  abuse.  It  enjoyed  the  greatest 
license  of  speech  and  boldly  and  mercilessly  attacked 
prominent  individuals  and  social  and  political  tenden¬ 
cies  of  the  day.  Its  chief  aim,  however,  was  to  amuse 
and  in  this  it  admirably  succeeded.  But  always  with 
the  comical  or  farcical  element  went  a  serious  purpose, 
as  the  comic  poet  wished  to  correct  abuses,  improve 
society,  or  discredit  individuals.  Present  in  Old 
Comedy  are  ribaldry  of  speech  and  frank  indecency, 
and  at  times  the  obscenity  which  had  characterized  the 
original  Dionysiac  revel. 

Comedy,  unlike  tragedy,  was  not  limited  as  to  sub¬ 
jects.  The  latter  was  largely  restricted  to  stories  taken 
from  mythology,  whereas  comedy  drew  freely  from 
contemporary  life  and  society,  politics,  religion,  and 
education.  Animal  life  might  enter  into  its  nature  and 
the  chorus  was  sometimes  dressed  to  represent  birds, 
wasps,  fishes,  goats,  etc. 

Our  sole  representative  of  the  Old  Comedy  is 
Aristophanes  (445-385  b.c.)  ,  a  comic  poet  of  great  and 
imaginative  powers,  of  keen  wit,  and  remarkable  lyric 
gifts.  His  eleven  extant  comedies  are  Acharnians, 
Knights ,  Clouds ,  Wasps,  Peace,  Birds,  Lysistrata, 
Thesmophoriazusae,  Frogs,  Ecclesiazusae  and  Plutus. 


214 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


The  activity  of  Aristophanes  was  largely  contempora¬ 
neous  with  the  course  of  the  long  Peloponnesian  War 
(431-403  b.c.)  and  condemnation  of  this  war  and  long¬ 
ing  for  peace  motivated  the  Acharnians ,  Knights ,  Peace 
and  Lysistrata.  The  Wasps  satirizes  the  Athenian 
mania  for  litigation.  In  the  Birds ,  an  exceedingly  witty 
and  lyrical  play,  expression  is  given  to  disgust  of  cer¬ 
tain  undesirable  features  of  Athenian  law  and  govern¬ 
ment  and  there  is  a  description  of  the  founding  of  an 
ideal  city-state,  a  Utopia  of  the  Birds,  Cloud-Cuckoo- 
Town.  Best  known  of  the  Aristophanic  comedies  are 
the  Clouds  and  the  Frogs.  In  the  Clouds  the  dramatist 
discredits  the  teaching,  influence  and  character  of 
Socrates,  who  is  unjustly  but  cleverly  identified  with 
the  dishonest  sophists  or  charlatan  teachers  of  the  day. 
This  extremely  entertaining  play,  in  which  the  victim 
Socrates  has  the  leading  role,  undoubtedly  did  much  to 
arouse  local  prejudice  against  the  noble  philosopher, 
who  later  suffered  martyrdom. 

The  Frogs  is  a  very  diverting  play,  containing  a 
wealth  of  wit  and  humor.  In  it  there  is  much  to  in¬ 
spire  serious  thought.  Aristophanes  had  a  three-fold 
purpose  in  writing  it:  First,  he  wished  to  lampoon 
Euripides,  whom  he  often  attacked  in  his  comedies 
as  a  bad  poet,  a  dangerous  playwright,  and  an  evil 
influence;  secondly,  he  was  eager  to  restore  and  re¬ 
habilitate  the  Eleusinian  Mysteries  which  had  been 
somewhat  neglected  during  the  latter  and  critical  years 
of  the  Peloponnesian  War;  thirdly,  he  urged  that  there 
must  be  political  harmony  and  general  amnesty  if 
Athens  was  to  be  saved. 

The  plays  of  Aristophanes  are  not,  and  cannot  be, 
popular  at  the  present  day  with  readers  or  an  audience 
who  do  not  possess  a  fairly  intimate  knowledge  of 
Athenian  civilization,  because  of  the  local  and  personal 
allusions  in  which  they  abound.  Satisfactorily  to  trans¬ 
late  them  for  readers  ignorant  of  Greek  is  well-nigh 
impossible,  as  the  dramas  bristle  with  coined  expres¬ 
sions,  plays  on  words,  and  references  which  are  mean- 


ATHENIAN  COMEDY 


215 


ingless  without  explanation.  But  these  comedies  are 
the  works  of  a  genius  of  a  high  order;  they  are  clever 
in  conception  and  striking  and  successful  in  dramatic 
execution.  As  documents  throwing  light  on  Athenian 
society  they  are  of  great  value  when  interpreted  with 
caution  and  judgment. 

The  New  Comedy  was  a  drama  of  very  different 
type.  The  abuse,  the  personalities,  the  moral  teaching, 
and  the  obscenity  of  the  school  of  Aristophanes  have 
disappeared  and  a  comedy  of  manners  has  taken  its 
place.  To  this  transition  the  plays  of  Euripides  with 
their  emphasis  on  human  relations  doubtless  con¬ 
tributed  much.  Changed  social  and  political  conditions 
in  Athens  are  likewise  responsible.  Human  nature,  its 
follies  and  weaknesses,  are  reflected  in  this  mirror  of 
life  ( speculum  vitae).  Certain  types  of  characters  are 
generally  present:  the  credulous  old  father,  the  ex¬ 
travagant  and  somewhat  undisciplined  son,  the  fawn¬ 
ing  parasite,  and  the  shrewd  slave.  Love  is  an  im¬ 
portant  theme  in  the  New  Comedy.  It  is  sometimes 
portrayed  in  its  lower  aspects,  often  in  its  nobler  mani¬ 
festations,  but  love-scenes  are  seldom  presented  before 
the  audience.  The  importance  of  the  chorus  dwindled 
and  it  was  retained  merely  to  entertain  the  audience  be¬ 
tween  the  scenes  with  song  and  dance.  The  great  rep¬ 
resentative  of  the  New  Comedy  is  Menander  (342- 
291  b.c.),  a  playwright  of  great  fame.  Despite  his 
popularity  and  dramatic  fecundity  no  complete  comedy 
of  his  has  come  down  to  us.  Until  recent  years  we 
knew  his  drama  only  through  the  Latin  adaptations  of 
his  works,  namely  the  Eunuch ,  Adelphi,  Self -Tor¬ 
ment  or,  and  Andria  of  Terence  and  the  Poenulus, 
Bacchides ,  and  Stichus  of  Plautus.  In  1905,  papyrus 
manuscripts  were  found  in  Egypt  which  contained 
large  portions  of  four  comedies,  the  Girl  with  the  Shorn 
Locks ,  Hero ,  Samian  Girl ,  and  Arbitrants „  While  these 
plays,  as  we  have  them,  by  no  means  justify  the  ex¬ 
travagant  praise  of  Menander  by  some  ancient  critics, 


216 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


as,  for  example,  Dio  Chrysostom  and  Plutarch,  who 
actually  preferred  Menander  to  Aristophanes,  yet  they 
reveal  a  skilful  dramatist,  who  is  particularly  success¬ 
ful  in  his  portrayal  of  character.  And,  as  Professor 
Capps  well  says,  “  the  literatures  of  Rome  and  modern 
Europe  bear  witness  to  the  qualities  of  universality  and 
permanence  in  the  New  Comedy  of  Athens  and  of  its 
greatest  representative,  Menander.” 


CHAPTER  XVI 

PHILOSOPHY 

“The  history  of  Greek  Philosophy  is,  in  fact,  the  history  of 
our  own  spiritual  past,  and  it  is  impossible  to  understand  the 
present  without  taking  it  into  account.”  —  J.  Burnet. 

“  There  may  be  greater  philosophical  conceptions  than  these 
the  Greeks  have  left  us,  but  I  know  not  where  they  are  unless 
they  are  in  the  future.”  —  F.  J.  E.  Woodbridge. 

AMONG  the  many  signal  achievements  of  the 
genius  of  the  Greeks,  their  contribution  to 
human  thought  in  the  realm  of  philosophy  is 
one  of  the  greatest.  Unlike  the  peoples  by  whom  they 
were  surrounded  the  Greeks  had  intense  intellectual 
curiosity,  a  thirst  for  knowledge,  and  a  desire  for  truth 
for  truth’s  sake.  Tradition  and  dogma,  it  is  true,  were 
their  inheritance  from  primitive  times,  as  is  the  case 
with  all  peoples,  but  the  Greeks  were  saved  from  the 
blight  of  superstition  and  from  intellectual  servitude 
by  the  originality  and  the  fearlessness  of  their  minds 
and  by  the  nature  of  their  religion.  Unlike  the  code  of 
the  Hebrews,  the  Greeks  had  no  sacrosanct  laws  to  dis¬ 
courage,  or  to  prohibit  altogether,  independent  thought 
and  judgment.  There  was  no  tribal  God,  conceived  as 
omnipotent,  whose  word  was  absolute  law.  No  hier¬ 
archical  or  ecclesiastical  dictation  permanently  banned 
original  inquiry.  On  the  contrary,  the  gods  were 
of  human  origin,  although  of  greater  than  human  power 
and  influence.  Goodness,  justice,  and  virtue  were 
to  be  sought  as  things  of  excellence  in  themselves 
and  not  as  mere  accompanying  attributes  of  a  personal 
deity  to  be  attained  through  unquestioning  obedience. 

In  the  first  place  it  must  be  understood  that  the  term 
philosophia  did  not  at  first  have  for  the  Greeks  its 

217 


218 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


modern  metaphysical  connotation.  It  meant  simply 
“  the  occupation  of  the  philosophos  ”  and  a  philosophos 
was  “  he  to  whom  wisdom  is  dear  so  Pythagoras,  who 
first  used  the  word,  called  himself.  A  little  later  the 
term  meant  “  a  learned  man  ”  or  “  one  of  liberal  educa¬ 
tion. Not  until  Plato  did  the  word  come  to  have  its 
peculiar  significance  of  “  one  who  speculates  on  the  na¬ 
ture  of  things.”  Aristotle  was  subsequently  called 
“  the  philosopher  ”  in  this  more  technical  sense. 

In  the  course  of  Greek  philosophic  thought  the  first 
speculation  of  the  earliest  thinkers  dealt  largely  with 
the  origin  and  nature  of  the  physical  universe.  This 
school  of  inquirers  is  called  the  Pre-Socratics  (the  pre¬ 
decessors  of  Socrates).  Somewhat  later,  questions  re¬ 
lating  to  knowledge  and  conduct,  ethics  or  human  re¬ 
lations,  and  ideas  and  ideals,  engaged  the  attention  of 
Socrates  and  Plato  and,  to  a  certain  extent,  of  Aristotle. 
In  the  schools  of  thought  following  Aristotle  the  Post- 
Aristotelians,  like  Socrates,  were  concerned  with  ethi¬ 
cal  problems,  but  more  from  the  viewpoint  of  the 
person  and  the  emotions.  Thus  we  have  Greek  philoso¬ 
phy  successively  engaged  in  the  study  of  physical 
science,  practical  life  and  ethics,  and  religion. 

For  convenience  of  study  the  field  of  Greek  philoso¬ 
phy  may  be  divided  into  the  three  great  divisions  in¬ 
dicated  above:  I.  The  Pre-Socratics;  II.  Socrates, 
Plato,  and  Aristotle;  III.  The  Post-Aristotelians. 

I.  The  Pre-Socratics 

It  must  be  confessed  at  the  outset  that  it  is  extremely 
difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to  gain  a  thoroughly  intelli¬ 
gent  comprehension  of  early  Greek  philosophy  (the 
Pre-Socratics)  because  of  the  very  fragmentary  nature 
of  the  extant  ancient  Greek  writings  bearing  on  the 
subject.  The  written  records  are  extremely  scanty  and 
consist  largely  of  meager  excerpts  handed  down  in  the 
form  of  quotations.  It  is,  therefore,  and  always  will  be, 
a  matter  of  dispute  as  to  the  exact  meaning  of  the  doc- 


PHILOSOPHY 


219 


trines  and  hypotheses  which  were  formulated  and  main¬ 
tained  by  these  early  thinkers. 

It  is  sometimes  said  that  Greek  philosophy  begins 
in  the  cosmogonies  and  theogonies  of  Homer  and 
Hesiod.  This  is  true  only  if  we  understand  the  term 
philosophy  in  its  broadest  significance  so  that  it  includes 
cosmogony,  mythology,  and  scientific  speculation.  The 
germs  of  more  speculative  thinking  are  seen  in  the 
sayings  attributed  to  the  Seven  Wise  Men  who  were 
legislators  and  rulers  throughout  the  Greek  world  — 
Thales,  Solon,  Periander,  Cleobulus,  Chilon,  Bias,  and 
Pittacus.  With  the  exception  of  Thales,  these  were  men 
of  practical  wisdom  merely:  they  were  sophoi ,  not 
philo so phoi.  Two  famous  sayings  are  “  Know  Thy¬ 
self  ”  and  “  Nothing  to  Excess,”  the  former  attributed 
to  Solon,  the  Athenian  statesman,  and  the  latter  to 
Chilon,  a  Spartan  ephor  of  the  sixth  century  b.c. 

It  was  in  Ionia,  in  Asia  Minor,  that  Greek  philosophy 
had  its  real  beginnings. 

A.  The  Ionic  School.  The  subject  which  concerned 
the  Ionian  thinkers  was  the  nature  of  the  world,  or, 
rather,  that  “  something  out  of  which  everything  in 
Nature  grows  and  is  made.”  Three  thinkers  of  Miletus, 
who  belong  to  the  sixth  century  b.c.,  attempted  to  an¬ 
swer  this  question:  Thales,  who  said  it  was  Water; 
Anaximander,  who  declared  it  was  the  Indefinite — i.e., 
an  original  substance,  “  a  limitless  something,”  out  of 
which  by  separation  all  things  have  their  origin  —  and 
Anaximenes,  who  made  it  Air.  It  is  difficult  indeed  to 
comprehend  just  what  these  thinkers  meant  by  these 
explanations.  Thales  apparently  wrote  nothing.  An¬ 
aximander,  it  is  true,  wrote  a  book,  perhaps  the  first 
Greek  book  in  prose,  but  it  has  perished,  as  has  Anaxi¬ 
menes’  prose  work.  The  Indefinite  of  Anaximander 
we  should  call  perhaps  the  ether.  It  is  that  illimitable 
substance,  that  original  something  which  occupies  all 
space ;  out  of  this  Anaximander  believed  that  all  things 
originate.  The  Air,  or  rather  vital  breath  of  Anaxi- 


220 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


menes  produced,  as  he  thought,  all  things  by  rarefaction 
and  condensation.  As  regards  the  world  itself,  we  are 
told  that  Thales  believed  the  earth  to  float  on  the 
water;  Anaximenes  thought  it  was  flat  and  that  it 
floated  upon  the  air,  as  did  also  the  heavenly  bodies; 
Anaximander,  however,  was  of  opinion  that  “  the  earth 
does  not  rest  on  anything,  but  swings  free  in  space,  be¬ 
ing,  in  shape,  a  short  cylinder.”  Modern  evolutionists 
should  note  the  striking  conjecture  of  Anaximander 
that  man  has  developed  from  an  aquatic  animal  pro¬ 
tected  by  a  covering. 

In  the  latter  part  of  the  sixth  century  b.c.  there  arose 
in  the  western  world  two  schools  of  thought  founded 
by  Greeks  who  came  from  Asia  Minor  —  Pythagoras  of 
Samos,  and  Xenophanes  of  Colophon. 

B.  The  Pythagoreans ,  The  school  of  Pythagoras, 
originally  from  Samos,  was  located  at  Croton  in 
Southern  Italy,  and  was  a  society  or  sect  the  members 
of  which  concerned  themselves  with  religious  and  po¬ 
litical  as  well  as  philosophical  questions.  Pythagoras 
left  no  writings,  but  the  fame  and  influence  of  his  school 
endured  for  centuries  and  references  in  literature  to  the 
beliefs  and  practices  of  the  brotherhood  are  numerous. 
From  these  statements  we  learn  that  Pythagoras,  who 
was  revered  by  his  followers  and  whose  word  was  law 
{ipse  dixit),  held  that  number  is  immanent  in  all  things 
and  is  not  a  mere  abstraction,  and  that  the  square 
is  the  symbol  of  perfection.  The  doctrine  of  trans¬ 
migration  of  souls  or  rebirth  (metempsychosis),  a  be¬ 
lief  of  the  Orphics,  was  taught  by  Pythagoras  and,  in 
addition,  his  disciples  followed  certain  Rules  of  Life 
and  Conduct.  These  rules  prescribed  a  strict  regimen 
as  to  diet,  beans,  for  example,  being  eschewed,  because, 
as  was  said  by  some,  they  contain  the  souls  of  the  dead ! 
Thus  Horace  ( Satires  II.  6.63)  humorously  speaks  of 
beans  as  the  kinsmen  of  Pythagoras  ( jaba  Pythagorae 
co  gnat  a).  The  philosophy  of  Pythagoras  was  con¬ 
cerned  with  religion,  practical  life  and  conduct,  and 


PHILOSOPHY 


221 


with  science.  In  fact,  certain  discoveries  in  arithmetic, 
geometry,  and  acoustics  are  attributed  to  the  master. 
Aristotle,  too,  credits  the  Pythagoreans  with  a  table 
of  opposites,  or  antitheses,  such  as  the  Odd  and  the 
Even;  the  One  and  the  Many;  the  Good  and  the  Bad, 
etc.  Antitheses,  adapted  and  taught  as  a  stylistic 
device  by  the  Sicilian  rhetoricians  through  Gorgias, 
became  fashionable  in  Greek  literary  composition  and 
are  familiar  and  effective  features  of  the  style  of  the 
orator  Antiphon  and  the  historian  Thucydides. 

C.  The  Eleatics.  Xenophanes  of  Colophon  is  a 
picturesque  figure  and  occupies  a  place  among  both 
the  thinkers  and  the  elegiac  poets  of  Greece.  For 
sixty-seven  years,  as  he  tells  us  in  an  extant  fragment 
of  a  poem  which  he  wrote  at  the  age  of  ninety-two, 
he  wandered  about  Greece  as  a  minstrel.  Finally, 
he  is  reputed  to  have  founded  a  school  at  Elea,  a  city 
in  southern  Italy,  where  he  taught  and  wrote. 

The  independence  of  the  views  of  Xenophanes  is  re¬ 
markable,  and  it  is  as  a  reformer  and  a  protestant  of  an 
early  day  that  he  arrests  our  attention.  The  excessive 
adulation  and  material  rewards  given  to  professional 
athletes  he  sternly  reprehended,  since  brain  and  in¬ 
tellectual  virtue,  he  asserted,  should  be  more  highly 
esteemed  than  brawn.  Moderation,  temperance,  and 
good  behavior  in  human  society  and  relations  he 
preached.  Current  religious  views  he  strove  to  combat. 
Pantheism  he  denied,  since  “  there  is  but  one  God,  the 
greatest  among  gods  and  men,  not  like  mortals  in  body 
or  in  mind  and  He,  with  His  whole  being,  sees  and 
thinks  and  hears.”  Xenophanes  anticipated  Plato  in 
censuring  the  poets  who  represent  the  gods  as  sinful, 
saying,  “  Homer  and  Hesiod  have  ascribed  to  the  gods 
all  things  that  are  a  shame  and  a  disgrace  among  mor¬ 
tals,  e.g.,  theft,  adultery,  and  deceit.”  Anthropo¬ 
morphism,  or  the  common  belief  that  the  gods  are 
human  in  form  and  appearance,  especially  aroused  his 
ire.  Men  merely  make  gods  with  their  own  image:  “If 


222 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


oxen  and  lions  had  hands  wherewith  to  portray  their 
gods  in  art,  they  would  give  to  them  the  bodies  of  oxen 
and  lions.”  The  fearless  independence  of  these  views 
maintained  in  the  sixth  century  b.c.  is  remarkable. 

Parmenides  of  Elea  was  a  hearer  of  Xenophanes 
and  of  far  greater  originality  as  a  thinker.  He  wrote 
a  work  on  Nature,  in  hexameter  verse,  of  which  some 
lines  are  preserved.  In  this  treatise  he  denied  the 
possibility  of  change  as  expounded  by  his  predecessors 
and  maintained  that  Being  alone  exists.  Whatever  is, 
is,  and  can  not  have  arisen  from  nothing.  Being  is 
immovable,  indivisible,  continuous,  and  finite.  Other 
prominent  Eleatics  were  Zeno  and  Melissus. 

D .  Physicists  of  the  Fifth  Century  b.c.  Heraclitus 
of  Ephesus  (early  fifth  century  b.c.)  was  pictur¬ 
esquely  designated  by  ancient  writers  as  “  the  weep¬ 
ing  philosopher  ”  because  of  the  supposed  sadness 
of  his  thought,  and  “  the  Dark  ”  because  of  the 
obscurity  of  his  utterances.  The  two  chief  doctrines 
associated  with  his  name  are  that  “  All  things  are  in  a 
State  of  Flux,”  nothing  being  fixed,  the  elements  freely 
changing  from  one  to  another,  and  that  “  Fire  is  the 
primal  Element.”  Some  of  his  striking  sayings  as  re¬ 
vealed  by  the  scanty  fragments  are:  “  Much  learn¬ 
ing  does  not  teach  men  to  think  ”;  “  You  cannot  step 
twice  into  the  same  river  ”;  “  War  is  the  father  of  all 
things.”  Of  interest  in  Heraclitus’  thought  is  his  idea 
of  the  soul,  which  to  him  was  real,  not  a  wraith,  al¬ 
though  “  You  cannot  discover  the  boundaries  of  the 
soul;  so  deep  it  is.”  As  fire  is  the  purest  element,  so 
the  soul  when  most  perfect  has  most  fire. 

Of  the  Pre-Socratics  it  remains  for  us  to  consider 
briefly  Empedocles,  Anaxagoras,  and  the  Atomists, 
Leucippus  and  Democritus,  all  of  the  fifth  century 

B.C. 

The  fame  of  Empedocles,  of  Akragas  (Agrigentum) 
in  Sicily,  has  been  greatly  enhanced  by  the  praise 
awarded  him  by  the  great  Roman  philosophical  poet 


PHILOSOPHY 


223 


Lucretius  (I.  716ft)  and  through  the  poem,  Emped¬ 
ocles  on  Aetna ,  of  Matthew  Arnold.  Empedocles,  a 
person  of  versatile  genius,  was  distinguished  for  his 
achievements  not  only  in  philosophy,  but  in  politics, 
medicine,  science,  mysticism,  and  poetry.  Numerous 
fragments  of  his  bold  verses  On  Nature  survive, 
“  verses  of  his  godlike  genius.”  Empedocles  won  great 
favor  as  a  statesman 'with  his  fellow-citizens  by  his 
democratic  measures,  while  his  cures  in  medicine  gave 
him  the  reputation  of  a  worker  of  miracles.  In  philo¬ 
sophical  speculation  he  postulated  four  immutable  ele¬ 
ments  or  roots,  fire,  water,  earth  and  air,  and  explained 
change  as  due  to  a  combination  or  mixture  of  these 
four.  It  is  to  be  observed  that  Empedocles  thus  added 
earth  to  the  water  of  Thales,  the  fire  of  Heraclitus,  and 
the  air  of  Anaximenes.  A  further  important  contribu¬ 
tion  to  physical  speculation  was  made  by  Empedocles 
when  he  essayed  to  assign  a  moving  or  motivating  cause 
to  account  for  the  relation  of  the  elements  to  one  an¬ 
other,  since  he  conceived  of  the  four  elements  as  origin¬ 
ally  gathered  together  in  a  sphere  which  he  asserted 
was  maintained  by  love  (attraction)  and  separable 
by  hate  (repulsion). 

In  his  religious  views  Empedocles  held  the  beliefs 
of  Pythagoras  and  the  Orphics,  for  he  believed  in  rein¬ 
carnation  and  asserted  that  he  could  recall  the  various 
forms  of  his  previous  existences.  A  story  popular  in 
antiquity,  but  unworthy  of  credence,  related  that  Em¬ 
pedocles  committed  suicide  by  throwing  himself  down 
the  crater  of  Aetna. 

Anaxagoras  of  Clazomenae,  a  city  of  Ionia,  early 
went  to  Athens  where  he  lived  and  taught  for  many 
years.  As  a  popular  teacher  his  influence  upon  the 
younger  generation  was  great,  in  particular,  upon 
Euripides.  He  was  compelled  finally  to  leave  Athens 
ostensibly  on  the  charge  of  atheism,  although  it  is 
probable  that  his  intimate  friendship  with  Pericles  had 
exposed  him  to  attack  from  the  statesman’s  enemies. 

Anaxagoras  was  greatly  interested  in  astronomy  and 


224 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


physics.  Matter,  the  sum  of  which  can  neither  be  in¬ 
creased  nor  diminished,  he  believed  to  be  composed  of 
an  infinite  number  of  particles  or  seeds;  he  held,  too, 
that  these  extremely  minute  particles,  each  having  its 
own  qualities,  can  be  divided.  A  thing  has  individual 
character  according  as  certain  corresponding  seeds  pre¬ 
dominate.  Order  or  arrangement  is  produced  in  the 
relation  of  these  particles  to  one  another,  originally 
indiscriminately  mixed,  by  Mind  or  Reason  ( Nous), 
which  is  the  source  of  motion  and  of  knowledge,  and 
Mind  alone  is  pure,  infinite,  and  not  mixed  with  any¬ 
thing.  An  object  into  which  Mind  has  entered  is  ani¬ 
mate.  Anaxagoras  was  highly  praised  by  Plato  and 
Aristotle  in  that  he  introduced  Reason  as  an  intelligent 
moving  cause,  but  they  censure  him  for  regarding  it 
as  too  much  in  the  light  of  a  mechanical  and  material 
agent. 

To  the  modern  world  and  to  modern  science  the 
doctrines  of  the  Atomists  are  of  surpassing  interest. 
The  author  of  the  Atomic  Theory  was  Leucippus  of 
Abdera,  of  whose  life  we  know  little.  The  views  of 
Leucippus  were  expanded  and  taught  by  Democritus, 
also  of  Abdera,  who  conceived  the  doctrine  that  there 
exist  the  Full  and  the  Empty ,  or  Atoms  and  the  Void. 
The  Void  is  the  infinite  space  or  vacuum  in  which  the 
atoms  are  constantly  moving  and  striking  upon  one 
another.  Thus  a  vortex  or  rotary  whirl  is  caused,  and, 
as  like  atoms  come  together  and  hold  together,  bodies 
and  even  worlds  are  formed.  The  atoms,  very  fine 
and  infinite  in  number,  are  thought  of  as  hard,  perma¬ 
nent,  and  indivisible  and  as  differing  in  size  and  shape. 
If  the  atoms  are  close  together  the  body  is  hard,  other¬ 
wise  it  is  soft.  It  will  be  seen  that  the  atomic  theory 
reconciles  the  opposing  views  of  Parmenides  and 
Heraclitus,  since  it  combines  the  idea  of  the  eternity 
of  reality  with  the  belief  in  perpetual  change.  To 
Greek  religious  feeling,  however,  it  did  violence  in  that 
the  doctrine  of  atomism  is  essentially  materialistic 
and  mechanical.  Empedocles  had  thought  of  Love 


PHILOSOPHY 


225 


and  Hate,  Anaxagoras  of  Reason,  as  directing  agents, 
but  Democritus  considered  the  universe  to  be  accidental 
and  not  produced  by  design,  as  it  was  the  result  of  the 
descent  of  atoms  through  space  and  of  their  fortuitous 
association. 

The  Atomic  Theory  of  Leucippus  and  Democritus 
ranks  with  the  greatest  discoveries  of  antiquity  in  our 
estimation,  but  it  met  with  slight  favor  in  the  fifth 
and  fourth  centuries  b.c.  It  remained  for  Epicurus 
to  adopt  it  to  support  his  views  antagonistic  to  current 
theology,  and  in  the  great  didactic  Roman  poem,  the 
De  Rerum  Natura  of  Lucretius,  we  have  its  lengthy 
exposition. 

Our  study  thus  far  of  early  Greek  philosophical 
thought  shows  us  that  the  chief  concern  was  with  the 
origin  and  nature  of  the  universe.  The  majority  of 
the  Pre-Socratic  thinkers,  in  fact,  were  keenly  inter¬ 
ested  in  the  physical  sciences  and  in  mathematics ;  their 
fame,  in  part,  rests  on  their  attainments  in  these  fields. 
Thales,  for  example,  was  a  mathematician  and  astrono¬ 
mer  and  predicted,  we  are  told,  an  eclipse  of  the  sun. 
Anaximander  created  geographical  science  and  drew 
the  first  map  of  the  world.  To  Pythagoras  tradition 
attributes  various  important  discoveries  in  arithmetic, 
geometry,  and  acoustics.  Empedocles  was  physician 
as  well  as  philosopher  and  Anaxagoras  was  deeply  con¬ 
cerned  with  physics  and  astronomy.  Furthermore, 
all  these  men  were  largely  cosmologists,  although 
Xenophanes  and  Pythagoras  were  thinkers  and  teach¬ 
ers  more  in  the  field  of  religion  and  conduct  and  the 
maxims  “  Know  thyself  ”  and  “  Nothing  to  excess  ” 
of  the  wise  men  were  familiar  precepts. 

II.  Socrates,  Plato,  and  Aristotle 

In  our  sketch  of  Greek  philosophic  thought  thus  far 
we  are  struck  by  the  fact  that  no  Athenian  appears 
in  the  list  of  these  early  inquirers.  To  be  sure,  the 
flower  of  the  Athenian  genius  did  not  come  to  full 


226 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


bloom  until  after  the  Persian  Wars.  But  the  fact  re¬ 
mains  that  Athens  produced  only  two  great  native 
philosophers,  Socrates  and  Plato  —  Aristotle  was  born 
at  Stagira  of  a  Thracian  mother.  Further,  these  think¬ 
ers  were  not  interested  in  cosmology  or  in  physical 
science,  but  in  humanism.  The  subjects  which  con¬ 
cerned  Socrates  and  Plato  are  human  conduct  and  re¬ 
lations,  society,  education,  and  politics.  And  these 
same  subjects  dominated  even  the  thought  of  Aristotle, 
catholic  scientist  as  he  was. 

It  was  the  Sophists  who  were  chiefly  responsible  for 
giving  this  direction  to  Athenian  thought.  Although 
these  thinkers  and  teachers  are  more  fully  discussed  in 
connection  with  education,  yet  a  few  words  should  be 
devoted  to  them  here. 

The  discordant  views  of  the  early  thinkers  relative 
to  cosmogony  and  to  the  nature  of  things  in  general 
inevitably  invited  scepticism  and  encouraged  disbelief 
in  the  possibility  of  the  attainment  of  truth.  The 
pronouncement  of  Protagoras  that  “  Man  is  the  meas¬ 
ure  of  all  things,”  therefore,  met  with  eager  welcome 
and  Socrates  and  Sophists  alike  turned  to  the  study  of 
humanism. 

The  term  Sophist  was  originally  a  title  of  respect, 
applied,  for  example,  to  the  Seven  Sages,  but  it  gradu¬ 
ally  acquired  an  invidious  sense  because  of  the  vain 
pretensions,  the  moral  insincerity,  and  the  greed  of 
gain  of  certain  teachers  of  the  fifth  and  fourth  cen¬ 
turies  to  whom  the  name  was  given.  These  men,  some 
of  whom  we  might  call  Professors  of  Practical  Wisdom, 
assumed  certainty  of  knowledge  and  claimed  infallible 
success  in  teaching  matters  relating  to  virtue  and  con¬ 
duct,  education  and  government.  They  were,  in  any 
case,  genuinely  interested  in  moral  science,  practical 
statesmanship,  and  rhetoric  and  grammar,  and  de¬ 
precated,  as  futile,  speculation  regarding  the  nature 
of  the  universe.  Best  known  of  these  teachers  were 
Protagoras,  Gorgias,  Prodicus,  Hippias,  Polus,  and 
Thrasymachus.  The  ability  of  these  men  is  unques- 


PHILOSOPHY 


227 


tionable  and  their  services  were  of  value  to  the  educa¬ 
tion  of  the  time  and  were  a  stimulation  to  thought  and 
independent  thinking.  But,  as  Plato  and  Aristotle 
clearly  show,  there  were  charlatans  among  the  Sophists 
as  a  whole,  particularly  those  who  are  called  the  Eris¬ 
tic s,  i.e.,  those  who  for  gain  practiced  and  taught  un¬ 
fair  disputation  or  the  use  of  fallacious  arguments  in 
representing  the  false  as  true,  in  the  winning  of  a  law¬ 
suit,  or  in  swaying  the  Assembly.  The  Clouds  of 
Aristophanes  shows  us,  although  in  exaggerated  fash¬ 
ion,  the  methods  and  the  results  of  sophistry  as  an  art. 
The  word  sophist  in  English  has  inherited  the  opprobri¬ 
ous  sense  only.  Yet  Socrates  himself  and  Isocrates  the 
rhetorician  were  Sophists  in  the  best  sense  of  the  term. 

The  way  is  now  clear  for  a  discussion  of  the  great 
Athenian  teachers  of  philosophy. 

A.  Socrates.  Socrates,  one  of  the  greatest  and 
most  influential  thinkers  in  the  history  of  human 
thought,  was  born  at  Athens  in  469  b.c.  and  was  put 
to  death  by  the  State  in  399  b.c.  He  was  the  son  of 
a  sculptor,  and  seems  to  have  received  the  usual  educa¬ 
tion  to  which  he  constantly  added  by  a  lifetime  of 
thought  and  study.  As  a  youth  he  entered  upon  the 
career  of  a  sculptor,  but  early  gave  up  this  profession  to 
devote  himself  to  the  mission  of  educating  his  fellow- 
citizens  in  ethical  standards.  Accordingly,  he  did  not 
concern  himself  much  with  politics  and  public  office,  al¬ 
though  he  actively  and  courageously  did  his  duty  as  a 
citizen  and  a  soldier.  As  a  soldier  he  fought  bravely  as 
a  hoplite  at  Potidaea,  where  he  saved  the  life  of  Alcibi- 
ades,  at  Delium,  and  at  Amphipolis.  As  a  citizen  he 
showed  great  moral  courage  on  two  occasions  partic¬ 
ularly,  as  we  learn  from  passages  in  the  Apology  of 
Plato. 

In  appearance,  Socrates  fell  far  short  of  the  Greek 
average  of  personal  attractiveness.  In  several  passages 
in  Plato  there  are  humorous  references  to  his  homeli¬ 
ness,  his  flat  nose,  rather  thick  lips,  and  prominent 


228 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


eyes.  In  stature  he  was  rather  short  and  corpulent; 
in  physique  rugged,  powerful,  and  of  the  greatest  en¬ 
durance.  In  dress  he  was  extremely  simple,  as  he 
went  barefoot  throughout  the  year  and  even  wore  the 
same  weight  of  garments  in  winter  and  summer  alike. 
In  food  and  drink  he  was  abstemious.  These  eccentric¬ 
ities  of  person  and  conduct  made  him  rather  conspicu¬ 
ous,  but  he  won  hosts  of  friends  among  the  discrimi¬ 
nating  by  his  generally  attractive  personality,  cheerful 
disposition,  modest  demeanor,  democratic  manners, 
and  sterling  virtues.  His  wife,  whom  he  married  rather 
late  in  life,  was  named  Xanthippe,  whose  misfortune 
it  is  to  be  accounted  by  ancient  and  modern  tradition 
a  scold  and  a  shrew.  If  the  lady  really  was  of  this 
disposition,  it  may  be  that  the  philosopher  gave  her 
some  grounds  for  complaint  by  reason  of  his  daily 
pursuits,  which  were  calculated  to  improve  the  morality 
of  his  fellow-citizens,  but  not  the  material  welfare  of 
his  own  family! 

In  his  youth,  Socrates  had  naturally  studied  the 
teachings  of  the  early  philosophers  and  scientists.  But 
he  soon  decided  that  in  these  subjects  sure  conclusions 
and  permanent  and  valuable  results  could  not  be 
achieved.  In  consequence,  he  turned  to  the  study  of 
conduct,  to  ethics,  and  to  practical  morality  devoting 
to  these  subjects  a  powerful  mind  and  moral  virtues. 
He  conceived  it  his  duty,  furthermore,  to  educate  his 
fellow-men,  to  “  rouse,  persuade,  and  rebuke  ”  them, 
and  to  disabuse  their  minds  of  ignorance,  prejudice,  and 
pretence.  As  an  educator  he  did  not  establish  a  school, 
as  Plato,  Aristotle,  Isocrates,  and  others  did,  nor  did  he 
accept  money  from  his  pupils,  as  was  the  case  with 
the  Sophists,  but  he  spent  his  days  talking  informally 
with  all  who  cared  to  converse  with  him  in  the  public 
places  of  Athens,  the  streets,  the  gymnasia,  the  work¬ 
shops  and  the  market-place. 

Socrates’  method  was  dialectic,  or  question  and 
answer,  used  in  an  endeavor  to  arrive  at  an  accurate 
definition  and  truthful  conclusion.  In  this  method 


PHILOSOPHY 


229 


and  in  its  results  is  to  be  found  the  basis  of  all  subse¬ 
quent  metaphysical  and  abstract  thinking.  Socrates 
would  ask  of  his  respondent,  What  is  Justice?  What  is 
Piety?  What  is  Courage?  Love?  Temperance?  A 
superficial,  thoughtless  answer  would  generally  be 
forthcoming.  His  manner  of  conducting  the  dis¬ 
cussion  then  would  be  to  start  with  some  thesis 
or  principle,  which  was  readily  admitted,  and  to 
proceed;  to  its  logical  consequences.  These  con¬ 
clusions,  unforeseen  by  the  respondent,  would  be  in¬ 
compatible  with  the  original  definition  and  obviously 
false  and  prejudiced.  In  the  Socratic  dialogues 
the  dialogue  at  times  ends  at  this  point,  because 
of  the  irritation  and  pique  of  the  respondent;  some¬ 
times  the  questioning  and  answering  continue  step  by 
step  until  a  satisfactory  conclusion  is  reached.  To 
Socrates  the  assumption  of  accurate  knowledge  and 
smug  intellectual  complacency  were  unpardonable.  It 
was  his  aim  to  substitute  for  this  a  realization  of  igno¬ 
rance  and  a  striving  for  the  truth.  The  hypocrisy,  in¬ 
sincerity,  pretence,  and  false  premises  of  certain  of 
the  Sophists  especially  aroused  his  indignation. 

Knowledge,  to  Socrates,  was  the  chief  desideratum. 
By  this  he  meant  practical  wisdom,  since  absolute 
knowledge  he  regarded  as  unattainable.  He  went  so 
far  as  to  declare  that  “  We  err  through  ignorance.  No 
one  knowingly  does  wrong.  Virtue  is  knowledge. 
Knowledge  is  attainable  through  education,  training, 
and  careful  definition.  Through  knowledge  we  arrive 
at  the  good,  which  is  the  useful  and  the  advantageous.’’ 
If  men  err  seeming  to  have  knowledge,  we  must  believe 
that  their  knowledge  is  really  ignorance.  Knowledge 
thus  lies  at  the  basis  of  all  virtues;  or  rather,  there  is 
but  one  virtue.  As  Mr.  Henry  Jackson  states:  “  Piety, 
justice,  courage  and  temperance  are  the  names  which 
‘wisdom’  bears  in  different  spheres  of  action:  to  be 
pious  is  to  know  what  is  due  to  the  gods;  to  be  just  is 
to  know  what  is  due  to  men;  to  be  courageous  is  to 
know  what  is  to  be  feared  and  what  is  not;  to  be 


280 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


temperate  is  to  know  how  to  use  what  is  good  and  avoid 
what  is  evil.”  Socrates  himself  constantly  assumed 
ignorance.  This  is  his  so-called  irony ,  which  was  very 
vexatious  to  those  who  at  first  were  sure  that  they 
knew,  only  to  discover  that  they  did  not. 

Many  of  the  great  moral  teachers  of  the  world,  as, 
for  example,  Christ,  themselves  wrote  nothing;  and  this 
is  true  of  Socrates,  but  his  philosophy  survives  for  us 
in  the  dialogues  of  Plato.  The  personality  of  the  philos¬ 
opher  is  revealed  to  us  not  only  by  Plato,  but  by 
Xenophon  in  his  Memorabilia.  The  influence  of  the 
teachings  of  Socrates,  who  himself  established  no 
school,  was  profound  on  all  the  post-Socratic  schools. 
Thus,  the  Academy  of  Plato  adopted  it  entire;  the 
Peripatetics  took  over  much  of  it;  the  Cyrenaics  ac¬ 
cepted  the  Socratic  ethics,  but  made  pleasure  the  basis 
thereof;  the  Epicureans,  with  a  saner  conception  of 
pleasure,  sprang  from  the  Cyrenaics;  the  Stoics  adopted 
the  simplicity  and  sincerity  of  the  Socratic  beliefs  and 
conduct;  the  Cynics  exaggerated  this  simplicity  and 
made  it  asceticism. 

We  have  next  to  consider  the  question  of  the  manner 
of  death  of  Socrates.  How  is  it  possible  that  the  Athe¬ 
nians,  of  all  people,  actually  put  to  death  a  man  like 
Socrates,  a  personality  so  attractive,  a  character  so 
noble,  a  teacher  so  sincere,  a  patriot  and  a  lover  of  his 
fellow-citizens? 

The  facts  are  briefly  these.  In  the  year  399  b.c., 
three  men,  Meletus  (the  spokesman),  a  poet  little 
known,  Lycon,  an  orator,  likewise  insignificant,  and 
Anytus,  a  wealthy  banker  and  prominent  democratic 
leader,  brought  an  indictment  against  Socrates  charg¬ 
ing  him  “  (1)  with  disbelief  in  the  gods  which  the  city 
believes  in  and  of  introducing  other  and  new  divinities, 
and  (2)  of  violating  the  laws  by  corrupting  the  youth.” 
The  trial  was  held  before  a  jury  of  501  Athenian 
citizens.  Plato  has  preserved  for  us  the  simple  but 
noble  and  impressive  speech,  Apologia ,  which  gives 
essentially,  no  doubt,  Socrates’  own  words  on  that 


PHILOSOPHY 


231 


momentous  occasion.  It  is  largely  a  statement  of  his 
life-work  and  teachings  and  a  justification  thereof, 
but  there  is  no  effort  to  conciliate;  rather  the  speech  is 
a  defiance.  In  it  there  is  no  appeal  for  clemency,  there 
is  no  acknowledgment  of  error,  there  is  no  promise  of 
different  behavior.  The  result  was  a  condemnation 
by  a  small  majority,  281  against  220  in  his  favor.  So¬ 
crates  was  then  asked  to  suggest  a  penalty  other  than 
that  of  death,  which  Meletus  had  proposed.  Xenophon 
declares  that  Socrates  might  have  been  acquitted  “  if 
in  any  moderate  degree  he  would  have  conciliated  the 
favor  of  the  jurymen.”  Instead  of  proposing  a  fine 
or  exile  as  an  alternative  to  the  death  penalty,  Socrates 
asserted  that  not  punishment  as  a  malefactor,  but  re¬ 
ward  as  a  benefactor,  was  his  real  desert  and  declared 
that  he  should  be  awarded  free  maintenance  by  the 
State  in  the  Prytaneum.  At  the  close  of  his  speech,  he 
grudgingly  offered  to  accept  a  fine  of  one  mina  ($18) 
raised  finally  to  30  minas;  the  latter  sum  was  pledged 
by  his  friends,  Plato,  Crito  and  others.  The  judges, 
alienated  still  further  by  these  statements  and  by  an 
attitude  which  seemed  to  them  inexcusable  and  un¬ 
intelligible,  condemned  him  by  a  much  greater  majority, 
80  larger  than  the  former  vote,  according  to  Diogenes 
Laertius.  The  execution  was  delayed  for  thirty  days, 
since,  according  to  the  Athenian  law,  the  return  from 
Delos  of  the  sacred  ship  must  be  awaited.  During 
these  days  spent  in  prison,  Socrates’  calm  demeanor  was 
absolutely  unchanged.  He  was  visited  repeatedly  by 
his  friends  and  his  discussions  of  life,  death  and  the 
immortality  of  the  soul  are  preserved  in  the  Platonic 
dialogues,  Crito  and  Phaedo.  He  might  have  escaped 
from  prison  had  he  cared  to  accept  a  plan  arranged  by 
his  friend  Crito,  but  he  refused  to  do  so  on  the  ground 
that  he  could  not  disobey  the  laws  and  that  the  truly 
wise  man  will  regard  approaching  death  with  equanim¬ 
ity  as  being  in  fact  a  boon.  He  drank  the  poison-cup, 
the  hemlock  juice,  with  utmost  calm  and  thus  died  in 
his  seventieth  year. 


232 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


What  is  to  be  said  briefly  of  the  truth  of  these 
charges?  (i)  Socrates  did  not  disbelieve  in  the  gods  — 
on  the  contrary,  he  was  sincerely  pious.  Xenophon 
says  that  no  one  ever  knew  of  his  doing  or  saying  any¬ 
thing  profane  or  unholy.  He  did  not,  of  course,  accept 
literally  the  current  mythology  in  all  its  traditional 
forms.  He  did  not  believe,  for  example,  in  the  dis¬ 
graceful  acts  attributed  from  prehistoric  times  to  the 
gods.  While  he  conceived  of  a  creator,  of  a  god  who 
was  supreme  above  all,  yet  he  did  not  deny,  nor  could 
he  have  escaped  from,  the  polytheism  of  his  time.  He 
scrupulously  observed  therefore  the  current  religious 
worship  and  observance.  (2)  What  is  meant  by  the 
charge  “  introducing  other  and  new  divinities  ”?  This 
doubtless  refers,  as  Xenophon  says,  to  his  “  Daimon- 
ion,”  that  inner  voice  or  conscience  which,  as  he  said, 
dissuaded  him  from  certain  actions.  But  in  any  case, 
it  was  not  illegal  in  Athens  to  introduce  new  divinities. 
(3)  The  final  charge,  namely,  that  he  “  corrupted  the 
youth,”  is  the  most  important.  It  was  asserted  that 
Socrates  had  contempt  for  Athenian  political  institu¬ 
tions,  and  especially  for  election  by  lot.  It  is  true  that 
he  was  not  entirely  in  sympathy  with  the  democracy  as 
then  constituted,  but  he  was  not  alone  in  holding  those 
views.  He  was,  however,  always  patriotic  and  law- 
abiding.  Socrates  was  further  blamed  for  his  pupils, 
Critias  and  Alcibiades,  but  these  men  turned  out  badly 
in  spite  of,  rather  than  because  of,  Socratic  teachings. 
Finally,  it  was  said  that  Socrates  taught  the  young  to 
disobey  parents  and  guardians  and  that  he  quoted 
passages  from  Homer  and  Hesiod  in  a  manner  sub¬ 
versive  to  public  morality;  these  charges  are,  of  course, 
absurd. 

It  is  evident  that  these  charges  are  not  the  only 
reasons  for  the  condemnation  of  a  man  whom  we  re¬ 
gard  —  if  Plato’s  portrait  of  him  is  genuine  —  as 
Athens’  greatest  citizen.  They  are  the  cloak  which 
conceals  the  real  animosity  originating  in  political  and 
personal  prejudice.  In  his  political  views  Socrates  was 


PHILOSOPHY 


233 


not  in  sympathy  with  the  oligarchical  faction  on  the 
one  hand,  or  with  the  extreme  democrats  on  the  other. 
He  had  clearly  shown,  by  word  and  deed,  his  hatred 
for  the  former,  as  in  his  resistance  to  the  Thirty 
Tyrants  in  404  b.c.  And  because  of  his  disbelief  in  the 
practice  of  the  election  by  lot  of  important  officers  of 
state,  and  by  reason  of  his  adverse  criticism  of  other 
features  of  an  unrestricted  democracy,  he  was  regarded 
with  hostility  by  the  extreme  democrats.  His  ac¬ 
cusers,  Meletus  and  the  others,  were  members  of  the 
extreme  democratic  party  of  Thrasybulus.  The  actual 
condemnation  of  Socrates,  however,  was  the  result  not 
so  much  of  political  animus  as  of  personal  prejudice 
and  popular  misunderstanding.  Although  Socrates  was 
surrounded  by  a  fairly  large  number  of  eager  listeners, 
understanding  pupils,  and  even  devoted  disciples,  who 
fairly  worshipped  him,  he  seems  to  have  been  popularly 
regarded  by  the  multitude  as  at  best  an  eccentric  bore 
and  at  worst  as  a  pernicious  menace  to  state  and 
society.  His  personal  appearance,  his  dress  and  manner 
of  life,  his  opinions,  which  often  were  unconventional 
and  heterodox  in  popular  estimation,  his  dialectic, 
which  had  discomfited  and  humiliated  so  many  promi¬ 
nent  and  conceited  persons,  the  conduct  of  some  of  his 
pupils  who  were  Socratic  in  method  only  —  all  these 
were  powerful  influences  in  rendering  him  unpopular. 
His  openly  expressed  dissatisfaction  with  traditional 
views  offended  the  conservatives,  who  sincerely  be¬ 
lieved  that  his  teachings  and  influence  were  certainly 
unsettling  and  probably  harmful  to  the  younger  genera¬ 
tion.  Thus,  both  the  thinking  and  the  unthinking  ele¬ 
ments  in  the  population  came  to  look  upon  him  with 
ever  greater  disfavor.  A  powerful  single  factor  which 
aroused  and  fanned  popular  feeling  against  Socrates 
was  the  comedy  of  Aristophanes,  the  Clouds.  This 
interesting  and  powerful  play,  originally  produced  in 
423  b.c.,  taking  advantage  of  the  license  of  the  Old 
Comedy  and  following  the  broad  path  of  caricature, 
ruthlessly  ridiculed  the  philosopher  as  a  man,  and 


234 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


grossly  misrepresented  his  views  and  his  teachings. 
The  playwright  ignorantly,  or  wilfully,  confused  Soc¬ 
rates  with  the  most  pernicious  of  the  Sophists,  and 
represented  him  as  accepting  money  for  tuition  in 
charlatanism  and  knavery.  The  play  was  amusing, 
but  grossly  unfair,  as  Socrates  himself  says  to  the  jury 
in  his  Apology: 1  “  Well,  what  do  the  slanderers  say? 
They  shall  be  my  prosecutors,  and  I  will  sum  up  their 
words  in  an  affidavit.  ‘  Socrates  is  an  evil-doer,  and 
a  curious  person,  who  searches  into  things  under  the 
earth  and  in  heaven,  and  he  makes  the  worse  appear 
the  better  cause;  and  he  teaches  the  aforesaid  doctrines 
to  others.’  Such  is  the  nature  of  the  accusation:  it  is 
just  what  you  yourselves  have  seen  in  the  comedy  of 
Aristophanes,  who  has  introduced  a  man  whom  he  calls 
Socrates,  going  about  and  saying  that  he  walks  in  air 
and  talking  a  deal  of  nonsense  concerning  matters  of 
which  I  do  not  pretend  to  know  either  much  or  little.” 

Socrates  was  a  thinker  ahead  of  his  time  and  paid 
the  penalty.  Unhappily,  through  a  combination  of  un¬ 
toward  circumstances,  his  life  had  a  tragic,  although 
triumphant,  end.  The  life  and  thought  of  the  man 
have  been  and  always  will  be  a  source  of  inspiration. 
As  Socrates  himself  wrote  nothing,  the  world  is  fortu¬ 
nate  in  having  such  a  life  and  teaching  brilliantly 
handed  down  to  us  in  the  writings  of  Plato,  although  it 
is  quite  probable  that  the  Platonic  Socrates  is  an  ideal¬ 
ized  person. 

B.  Plato.  Plato,  one  of  the  most  profound  phil¬ 
osophers  that  ever  lived,  is  also  one  of  the  greatest 
writers  and  masters  of  prose  style.  He  was  born,  per¬ 
haps,  in  427  b.c.,  in  Athens,  and  of  an  aristocratic  fam¬ 
ily,  and  was  certainly  well  educated.  About  407,  he 
joined  the  group  of  followers  of  Socrates,  and  became 
one  of  the  most  devoted  of  the  disciples  of  that  master 
for  some  years,  until  the  death  of  Socrates  in  399  b.c. 
The  next  few  years  Plato  spent  in  travel,  visiting 

1  The  translations  of  the  Platonic  passages  are  by  Jowett. 


PHILOSOPHY 


23  5 


Egypt,  Sicily,  and  Magna  Graecia.  About  387,  Plato 
established  a  school  of  philosophy  in  the  Academy,  one 
of  the  three  great  gymnasia  of  Athens.  With  the  excep¬ 
tion  of  two  brief  visits  to  Syracuse,  he  wrote  and 
taught  at  Athens  until  his  death  there,  in  347  b.c.,  at 
the  age  of  eighty. 

The  writings  of  Plato  are  voluminous  and  seem  to 
have  been  preserved  to  us  in  their  entirety.  Forty-two 
dialogues  and  thirteen  letters  are  extant  under  Plato’s 
name.  Most  scholars  regard  the  letters  as  spurious; 
of  the  other  writings  —  all  dialogues  with  the  exception 
of  the  Apology  of  Socrates  —  these  compositions  are 
generally  accepted  as  genuine:  Apology ,  Euthyphro , 
Crito,  Charmides ,  Laches ,  Lysis ,  Hippias  Minor ,  Ion , 
Menexenus,  Protagoras,  Meno,  Euthydemus ,  Gorgias, 
Cratylus,  Symposium,  Phaedo,  Republic,  Phaedrus, 
Parmenides,  Theaetetus,  Sophist,  Statesman,  Philebus, 
Timaeus,  Critias  and  Laws.  It  is  difficult  to  estimate 
the  indebtedness  of  Plato  to  Socrates,1  who  is  the  chief 
speaker  in  most  of  these  dialogues,  and  a  subordinate 
speaker  in  four  of  them.  In  the  Laws  alone  he  does  not 
appear.  Much  of  the  philosophical  thought  is  certainly 
of  Socratic  origin,  but  the  whole  elucidation  and  inter¬ 
pretation  have  been  elaborated  and  refined  and  trans¬ 
muted  by  Plato’s  alchemy.  The  dialectic  method  of 
the  master,  the  favorite  cross-examination  by  question 
and  answer,  is  followed  by  the  pupil  who  likewise  is 
chiefly  concerned  with  questions  of  conduct  and  with 
the  formulation  of  the  laws  that  govern  moral  behavior. 
Plato  subscribes  to  the  Socratic  thesis  that  virtue  is 
knowledge  and  sin  is  ignorance.  No  one  willingly 
chooses  evil.  The  virtuous  life  is  the  happy  life. 

In  this  necessarily  brief  sketch  it  is  impossible  to 
characterize  in  detail  all  the  dialogues.  The  nature  of 
a  few  of  the  most  important  may  be  indicated. 

1  The  traditional  view  that  the  real  source  of  the  Dialogues  of  Plato 
is  Socrates  and  his  teachings  is  attacked  by  Eugene  Dupreel,  La  Legende 
Socratique  et  les  Sources  de  Platon  (Oxford,  1922),  who  substitutes,  with¬ 
out  convincing  proof,  the  Sophists. 


236 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Four  compositions  tell  us  of  the  trial,  last  days  in 
prison,  and  death  of  Socrates,  namely,  the  Euthyphro 
(an  attempt  at  a  definition  of  piety),  the  Apology 
(Socrates’  speech  at  his  trial),  the  Crito  (so  named 
from  Socrates’  wealthy  friend  who  vainly  tries  to  save 
him  and  effect  his  release  from  prison),  and  the  Phaedo 
(named  after  a  follower  who,  in  this  dialogue, 
relates  the  events  of  Socrates’  last  days  and  reports 
the  argument  whereby  the  master  shows  that  the 
wise  and  virtuous  man  will  meet  death  cheerfully, 
because  the  soul  is  immortal).  The  Lysis  discusses 
friendship;  the  Charmides ,  temperance;  the  Laches , 
courage.  Four,  Protagoras ,  Gorgias ,  Euthy demits,  and 
Cratylus,  named  after  the  famous  Sophists,  explain  the 
attitude  and  teaching  of  those  teachers.  The  theme 
of  the  Meno  is,  “  Virtue  is  Knowledge,”  while  the 
Phaedrus  discusses  philosophic  love.  The  Symposium 
delightfully  describes  a  banquet  at  the  house  of  the 
tragic  poet  Agathon  and  the  discussion  of  Love  by  the 
guests;  the  Republic  deals  with  the  nature  of  justice 
and  the  founding  of  an  ideal  city-state  based  on  jus¬ 
tice;  the  Timaeus  is  a  cosmogony;  the  Laws,  a  modi¬ 
fication  or  revision  of  the  Republic,  is  a  discussion  of 
legislation  for  the  best  state  practicable. 

These  numerous  dialogues  are  extremely  dramatic 
in  setting  and  execution.  In  fact,  many  can  be  analyzed 
on  the  analogy  of  a  Greek  tragedy  and  have  easily 
discerned  parts,  which  may  be  designated  prologue, 
episodes,  and  epilogue.  Dramatic,  too,  is  the  dialogue 
with  the  clash  of  wills  and  the  rhetorical  contention. 
The  language  is  of  singular  beauty  and  appropriate¬ 
ness.  As  Professor  Shorey  says:  “Plato’s  prose  is  of 
wonderful  variety  and  power,  varying  from  the  col¬ 
loquial,  to  dialectic  precision;  it  is  imaginative,  mysti¬ 
cal,  everything  but  oratorical.  It  combines  quotation, 
parody,  literary  and  historic  allusion,  idiom,  proverb, 
dialect,  allegory,  technical  vocabularies  of  all  arts, 
sciences,  and  professions.  Composite,  suggestive,  poly¬ 
chromatic,  literary  prose  was  created  by  Plato.” 


PHILOSOPHY 


237 


The  Republic  is  Plato’s  greatest  work.  It  is  a 
lengthy  dialogue  in  ten  books,  the  scene  being  the 
house  of  Cephalus,  father  of  Lysias  the  orator,  in  the 
Piraeus.  Socrates  is  the  leading  speaker  in  the  discus¬ 
sion,  which  begins  with  a  conversation  on  old  age, 
continues  with  attempted  definitions  of  justice,  and  is 
developed  and  concluded  with  the  practical  application 
of  justice  in  the  establishment  of  an  ideal  state.  This 
perfect,  speculative  Greek  city  is  to  be  no  faulty 
Athenian  democracy,  but  an  ideal  aristocracy.  There 
are  three  classes  in  the  ideal  state :  ( i )  the  artisans  and 
husbandmen,  or  the  producers,  who  have  nothing  to  do 
with  the  government;  (2)  the  auxiliaries  or  guardians, 
the  warriors  who,  chosen  in  infancy,  have  been  trained 
in  philosophy  for  their  duties  as  commanders  in  war 
and  subordinate  magistrates;  (3)  the  philosopher- 
statesmen,  a  small  and  highly  select  class  who  have 
been  rigorously  and  successfully  disciplined  and  have 
accurate  comprehension  of  the  greatest  of  the  Platonic 
Ideas,  the  Idea  of  the  Good.  In  describing  this  Utopia, 
Plato  allows  his  vivid  fancy  and  fertile  imagination  to 
have  full  play,  and  the  progress  of  the  discussion  un¬ 
folds  before  us  a  bewildering  succession  of  suggestions, 
recommendations,  and  hypotheses.  Many  fundamental 
problems  of  government,  education,  and  society  in  gen¬ 
eral  are  acutely  stated  and  discussed  with  striking  con¬ 
clusions.  Professor  Shorey  has  summarized  these  ques¬ 
tions  in  this  pregnant  sentence: 

“  The  division  of  labor,  specialization,  the  formatiop 
of  a  trained  standing  army,  the  limitation  of  the  right 
of  private  property,  the  industrial  and  political  equality 
of  women,  the  improvement  of  the  human  breed  by 
artificial  selection,  the  omnipotence  of  public  opinion, 
the  reform  of  the  letter  of  the  creeds  to  save  their  spirit, 
the  proscription  of  unwholesome  art  and  literature,  the 
reorganization  of  education,  the  kindergarten  method, 
the  distinction  between  higher  and  secondary  educa¬ 
tion,  the  endowment  of  research,  the  application  of 
higher  mathematics  to  astronomy  and  physics  —  such 


238 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


are  some  of  the  divinations  and  modernisms  of  that 
wonderful  work.” 

In  consequence  of  the  wealth  and  striking  nature  of 
suggestions  for  an  ideal  society,  the  Republic  must  be 
studied  by  all  students  of  politics,  education,  and  so¬ 
ciety.  It  has  inspired  such  ancient  works  as  Cicero’s 
De  Republica  and  St.  Augustine’s  City  of  God ,  and 
such  modern  treatises  as  More’s  Utopia ,  Bacon’s  Atlan¬ 
tis ,  and  Bellamy’s  Looking  Backward.  The  Republic 
certainly  shows  that  Plato  was  not  an  admirer  of  Athe¬ 
nian  institutions,  but  more  inclined  to  the  education, 
laws,  and  government  of  Sparta. 

The  reader  of  the  Republic  must  not  entertain  the 
belief,  however,  that  every  suggestion  found  in  that 
work  is  the  final,  sober  dictum  of  the  philosopher  which 
he  thought  could  be,  and  should  be,  immediately 
realized  in  Athens  of  the  fifth  century  b.c.  This  con¬ 
ception  is  often  erroneously  held.  The  Republic  is  an 
imaginary,  speculative  commonwealth,  which  is  gradu¬ 
ally  evolved  in  the  course  of  a  long  discussion  and  is 
hypothetical  and  purely  tentative.  In  this  work  Plato 
is  more  poet  than  prose-writer,  and  the  mythical,  the 
mystical,  the  imaginative,  and  the  poetical  elements 
alternate  with  sober  and  reasoned  practicality.  It  is 
unreasonable,  therefore,  for  the  literal-minded  to  query 
every  speculation  in  the  Republic  and  ask  if  Plato 
thought  every  proposal  capable  of  realization  then,  or 
at  any  time,  and  desirable  of  attainment  if  realizable. 

This  is  the  question,  by  the  way,  of  Glaucon  in  Book 
V  who  asks:  “  Is  such  a  state  possible?  ”  and  Socrates 
replies,  “  We  were  led  to  form  our  ideal  polity  in  the 
search  after  justice,  and  the  just  man  answered  to  the 
just  state.  Is  this  ideal  at  all  the  worse  for  being  im¬ 
practicable?  Would  the  picture  of  a  perfectly  beauti¬ 
ful  man  be  any  the  worse  because  no  such  man  ever 
lived?  Can  any  reality  come  up  to  the  idea?  Nature 
will  not  allow  words  to  be  fully  realized.  Until  kings 
are  philosophers ,  or  philosophers  are  kings,  cities  will 


PHILOSOPHY  239 

never  cease  from  ill;  no,  nor  the  human  race;  nor  will 
our  ideal  polity  ever  come  into  being  ” 

So,  too,  in  the  Laws,  Plato  speaks  of  his  ideal  state, 
based  on  philosophy  and  communism,  as  impossible  of 
realization  in  his  age,  although  it  is  to  be  regarded  as 
a  model. 

Some  of  the  suggestions  for  the  ideal  state  are  fa¬ 
miliar,  indeed,  to  us.  Some  have  been  put  into  effect 
in  our  own  state,  others  would  be  adopted,  if  certain 
thinkers  had  their  way. 

A  small  community  is  postulated  both  by  Plato  and 
Aristotle,  as  the  Greek  political  thinker  thought  in 
terms  of  a  small,  compact,  homogeneous  population; 
with  this  only  was  he  familiar.  The  ideal  state  in  the 
Republic  has  a  population  of  about  1000  warrior- 
citizens;  in  the  Laws  it  has  about  5000.  Plato  would 
be  surprised,  indeed,  to  see  the  democracy  of  the  United 
States,  a  commonwealth  comprising  dozens  of  great 
states,  and  a  population  of  over  a  hundred  millions. 
A  real  and  permanently  successful  democracy  was  to 
him  unthinkable,  because  perfect  liberty  for  the  indi¬ 
vidual  would  inevitably  degenerate  into  license  and 
into  discord,  prejudicial  and  fatal  to  the  general  wel¬ 
fare.  Genuine  democracy,  which  is  our  ideal,  doubtless 
seemed  to  Plato  utterly  unattainable,  as  indeed  it  was 
in  his  day,  and  for  that  matter  still  is  yet  to  be  realized 
in  our  grievously  imperfect  modern  world,  in  spite  of 
the  long,  slow,  painful  steps  forward  which  the  human 
race  has  made  in  order  to  arrive  at  its  present  condi¬ 
tion.  Thus  it  is,  that  Plato’s  polis  is  a  military  state, 
trained  for  war,  and  aristocratic  in  nature.  The  citi¬ 
zens  form  an  upper  class;  the  toilers  and  slaves  are 
below  them  as  a  permanent  lower  caste.  Harmony, 
and  universal  social  and  political  brotherhood,  Plato 
can  not  conceive. 

Plato’s  silence  with  regard  to  international  relations 
is  a  glaring  and  regrettable  omission  to  many  modern 
readers  of  the  Republic,  who  forget  the  time  and  the 
place  of  the  composition,  or  ignore  the  racial  origin 


240 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


of  the  writer.  To  the  Greeks  of  the  fifth  century  b.c., 
the  world  was  divided  into  two  classes  —  Hellenes  and 
Barbarians.  The  former  were  supreme  in  language, 
literature,  art,  government,  and  civilization;  the  latter, 
non-Greeks,  were  immeasurably  inferior  in  all  these 
respects.  The  Greeks  thought  of  the  Persians  to  the 
east,  and  the  races  to  the  north,  as  wild  hordes,  against 
whom  they  must  always  be  on  the  military  defensive. 
It  was  not  a  question  of  international  concord  and 
amity  with  these  races;  it  was  the  possibility  of  na¬ 
tional  and  racial  salvation,  although  surrounded  by 
hostile  and  invading  peoples.  Furthermore,  it  must  be 
remembered  that  the  Greeks  themselves  were  passion¬ 
ately  fond  of  independence,  and  that  this  love  of  com¬ 
plete  autonomy  and  craving  for  “  self-sufficiency,”  dis¬ 
couraged  amicable  relations  among  themselves.  A 
permanent  and  successful  league  of  Greek  states  was 
therefore  impossible.  Even  great  crises  affecting  the 
Hellenes  of  the  mainland  as  a  whole,  e.g.,  the  Persian 
and  Macedonian  invasions,  resulted  only  in  imperfect, 
temporary,  and  by  no  means  unanimous  inter-state 
combinations.  The  student  of  Greek  civilization  in 
the  time  of  Plato  is  not  surprised,  therefore,  that  the 
question  of  foreign  relations  is  not  discussed  in  the 
works  of  the  Athenian  philosopher. 

Plato’s  preference  for  Spartan  institutions  may  be 
seen  in  a  number  of  regulations  suggested  for  his  ideal 
state.  The  more  important  of  these  are  the  common 
meals  for  men,  the  provision  that  youths  should  under¬ 
go  compulsory  military  training,  gymnastic  exercises 
for  women,  the  declaration  that  citizens  should  be 
soldiers  and  not  tradesmen,  the  inculcation  in  the  young 
of  great  reverence  for  parents  and  elders,  the  putting 
out  of  the  way  of  deformed  children,  the  equality  of 
the  sexes,  and  the  communistic  division  of  property. 

With  regard  to  Plato’s  advocacy  of  communism  a 
word  of  warning  must  be  spoken.  The  Platonic  con¬ 
ception  of  community  of  property  and  life  is  not  the 
modern.  It  is  not  socialistic,  as  we  understand  so- 


PHILOSOPHY 


241 


cialism.  The  communism  of  Plato  is  class  legislation, 
affecting  the  highest  classes,  i.e.,  the  guardians  and 
auxiliaries  in  the  commonwealth,  and  was  not  inspired 
by  social  ills,  such  as  poverty  and  the  exploitation  of 
the  poor  by  the  rich  or  of  labor  by  capital.  Plato  is 
not  interested  in  collective  property  per  se.  His  recom¬ 
mendation  is,  that  guardians  shall  be  forbidden  the 
possession  of  private  property  to  the  end  that  selfish¬ 
ness,  or  the  thought  of  personal  and  material  gain,  may 
be  removed  from  their  minds.  We  may  quote  from  the 
fifth  book  of  the  Republic :  “  The  guardians  are  not  to 
have  houses  or  lands  or  any  other  property;  their  pay 
is  to  be  their  food,  which  they  are  to  receive  from  the 
other  citizens,  and  they  are  to  have  no  private  expenses; 
for  we  intend  them  to  preserve  their  true  character  of 
guardians.” 

So  it  is,  that  abolishment  of  property  for  the 
guardians  is  recommended  with  the  purpose  of  remov¬ 
ing  temptation,  that  the  guardians  may  be  utterly  dis¬ 
interested  and  wholly  altruistic  for  performing  their 
duties  in  the  public  welfare. 

The  same  idea  underlay  the  proposal  of  a  community 
of  wives  and  children.  Just  as  the  possession  of  private 
property  militates  against  thought  for  the  common 
good,  so  the  institution  of  the  family  makes  a  whole¬ 
hearted  devotion  to  the  State  impossible.  “  Both  the 
community  of  property  and  the  community  of  families, 
as  I  am  saying,  tend  to  make  them  more  truly 
guardians;  they  will  not  tear  the  city  in  pieces  by  dif¬ 
fering  about  “  mine  ”  and  “  not  mine  ”;  each  man  drag¬ 
ging  any  acquisition  which  he  has  made  into  a  separate 
house  of  his  own,  where  he  has  a  separate  wife  and 
children  and  private  pleasure  and  pains;  but  all  will 
be  affected  as  far  as  may  be  by  the  same  pleasures  and 
pains  because  they  are  all  of  one  opinion  about  what 
is  near  and  dear  to  them,  and  therefore  they  all  tend 
towards  a  common  end  ”  ( Republic ,  V). 

The  suggestion  of  a  community  of  wives  and  children 
was  as  alien  and  repugnant  to  Greek  ideals  as  to  our 


242 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 

own.  For  the  sake  of  the  argument  of  what  imper¬ 
sonally  is  the  ideal  good  of  the  ideal  state  the  human 
relationships  of  husband  and  wife,  parents  and  chil¬ 
dren,  are  swept  away  by  Plato.  In  the  interest  of 
eugenics  and  racial  improvement  the  breeding  of  chil¬ 
dren  is  to  be  supervised,  parents  are  not  to  know  and 
rear  their  own  children,  and  offspring  will  be  cared  for 
by  nurses  and  caretakers  of  the  State.  Plato’s  readers 
would  admit  that  family  life  is  responsible  for  serious 
distractions,  but  they  would  urge  that  there  are  com¬ 
pensations  and  advantages  of  a  personal  and  social  na¬ 
ture  which  heavily  outweigh  them.  It  is  not  surprising, 
therefore,  that  in  his  later  work,  the  Laws ,  Plato  gives 
up  this  recommendation. 

Another  perplexing  and  much  discussed  question  in 
connection  with  Plato  and,  in  particular,  the  Republic , 
is  the  philosopher’s  attitude  towards  poets  and  poetry. 
Plato  himself  wrote  poetry  in  youth;  his  own  prose 
style  is  poetic  in  the  extreme,  being  rhythmical,  imagi¬ 
native,  and  figurative.  In  his  compositions  are  numer¬ 
ous  poetical  quotations  which  show  his  fondness  for 
the  poets  and  his  admiration  for  that  inspired  art. 
Why,  then,  in  the  Republic  does  he  disapprove  of  the 
poets  and  even  go  so  far  as  to  banish  Homer  altogether 
from  his  ideal  state? 

An  exact  answer  to  this  question  is  difficult  and 
would  require  longer  discussion  than  may  here  be  de¬ 
voted  to  it.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  Plato,  in  his  analysis 
of  education  and  of  those  influences  which  tend  to  in¬ 
culcate  an  appreciation  of  truth  in  the  young,  is  led 
to  point  out  unfortunate  passages  in  the  poets  who 
serve  as  the  very  foundation  of  the  education  of  the 
young.  Epic  poetry,  for  example,  is  full  of  unbecoming 
stories  of  the  gods  which  are  unfit  for  the  ears  of  the 
immature.  And  these  stories  are  not  only  impure; 
worse  still,  they  are  false.  Poetry,  in  general,  is  full  of 
falsehoods,  whereas  the  truth  is  the  chief  end  of  educa¬ 
tion.  Furthermore,  poetry  is  imitative  and  not  real; 
it  is  emotional  and  not  rational ;  it  is  productive  of  un- 


PHILOSOPHY 


243 


wholesome  excitement  and  illusion.  Drama  through 
its  poignant  appeal  to  the  emotions  is  a  harmful  indul¬ 
gence  and  a  bad  instrument  of  education.  The  exigen¬ 
cies  of  the  argument  gradually  but  inexorably  compel 
Plato  to  exclude  most  poetry  because  only  that  which 
is  pure,  noble,  beautiful,  and  elevating  can  be  tolerated 
in  a  perfect  state.  Poetry  and  art  are  important,  but 
above  all  it  is  the  soul  which  must  be  fostered  by  the 
truth.  Therefore,  “  we  are  ready  to  acknowledge 
that  Homer  is  the  greatest  of  poets  and  first  of  tragedy 
writers ;  but  we  must  remain  firm  in  our  conviction  that 
hymns  to  the  gods  and  praises  of  famous  men  are  the 
only  poetry  which  ought  to  be  admitted  into  our  state. 
For  if  you  go  beyond  this  and  allow  the  honeyed  muse 
to  enter,  either  in  epic  or  lyric  verse,  not  law  and  the 
reason  of  mankind,  which  by  common  consent  have 
ever  been  deemed  best,  but  pleasure  and  pain  will  be 
the  rulers  in  our  state  ”  (Book  X). 

In  the  Laws  a  modified  view  of  the  poets  is  taken. 
Their  art  is  not  to  be  condemned  outright,  but  a  censor¬ 
ship  of  poetry  must  be  exercised  by  the  responsible 
magistrates  to  the  end  that  poets  of  good  repute  shall 
sing  of  noble  thoughts  and  noble  deeds. 

Finally  in  our  consideration  of  Plato  let  us  speak 
briefly  of  his  Theory  of  Ideas,  the  very  cornerstone  of 
his  philosophical  edifice.  The  Greek  word  idea  really 
means  “  form,”  i.e.,  (originally)  visible  form;  the 
English  word  idea  is  simply  a  transfer,  not  a  translation 
from  the  Greek.  Plato  believed  that  the  things  of  this 
world  about  us  are  only  imperfect  and  ephemeral 
copies  of  the  eternal  Ideas.  The  latter  are  the  realities 
of  the  world  of  Ideas;  the  former  are  mere  pictures  of 
the  perfect  originals.  In  extremely  poetic  language 
Plato  maintains  the  reality,  the  perfection,  the  prece¬ 
dence,  and  the  eternal  nature  of  the  Ideas  as  compared 
and  contrasted  with  the  things  of  this  world.  To  his 
mind  the  Ideas  are  personified  and  become  as  living 
shapes  and  beings.  Of  them  we  have  knowledge,  be¬ 
cause  our  souls  have  beheld  them  in  pre-natal  vision. 


244 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


The  greatest  of  these  ideas  is  the  Idea  of  Good,  which 
is  the  source  of  everything;  this  Idea  only  the  thor¬ 
oughly  disciplined  may  apprehend.  Such  a  one  will 
be  the  real  philosopher,  the  philosopher-king,  who  alone 
will  be  qualified  to  rule  the  ideal  state. 

C.  Aristotle.  Aristotle  (384-322  b.c.)  was  born  in 
Thrace,  at  Stagira,  where  his  father  was  physician  to 
Amyntas  II  of  Macedon,  but  he  obtained  his  philo¬ 
sophical  education  in  Athens  and  for  some  twenty  years 
was  the  pupil  and  companion  of  Plato.  Aristotle’s  in¬ 
debtedness  to  his  teacher  is  very  great  but  his  inde¬ 
pendence,  originality,  and  scientific  type  of  mind  caused 
him  to  pursue  more  exact  and  less  imaginative  studies. 
In  342  b.c.,  Aristotle  accepted  the  tutorship  of  young 
Alexander  of  Macedon,  then  thirteen  years  of  age.  We 
are  not  in  a  position  to  know  the  extent  of  his  influence 
upon  the  young  prince.  Milton,  it  is  true,  says  that 
Aristotle  bred  Alexander  to  subdue  the  world,  but  this 
is  unlikely  in  the  extreme,  since  the  keynote  of  Aris¬ 
totle’s  philosophy  was  the  golden  mean.  In  335  b.c., 
Aristotle  established  in  Athens  his  school  in  the  gym¬ 
nasium  called  the  Lyceum.  His  pupils  gained  the  ap¬ 
pellation  Peripatetics ,  from  the  fact  that  the  master 
frequently  lectured  while  walking  with  his  disciples 
along  the  garden  path  ( peripatos ).  Here  he  taught 
for  twelve  years,  until  his  retirement  to  Euboea  where, 
too,  he  died. 

Dante  calls  Aristotle  the  “  Master  of  those  who 
know.”  Certainly  his  intellectual  curiosity  was  prodi¬ 
gious  and  the  range  of  his  studies  and  writings  almost 
incredible.  His  works  may  be  grouped  in  the  following 
divisions:  I  Logic  II  Natural  Sciences  III  Psychology 
and  Metaphysics  IV  Ethics  V  Politics  VI  Rhetoric. 

His  Organon ,  to  use  the  Peripatetic  name  for  what 
was  subsequently  designated  Logic,  is,  perhaps,  Aris¬ 
totle’s  most  notable  work.  At  any  rate,  with  its  study 
of  the  syllogism  and  its  exposition  of  the  ten  categories, 
or  forms  of  thought,  substance,  quantity,  quality,  place, 


PHILOSOPHY 


245 


time,  relation,  action,  passion,  posture  or  relative  posi¬ 
tion  of  parts,  and  habit  or  state,  it  is  the  foundation 
of  modern  logic. 

His  investigations  in  the  Natural  Sciences,  such  as 
the  History  of  Animals ,  De  Caelo ,  and  Physics ,  are  to 
us  the  least  important  of  his  researches,  because  of  the 
great  achievements  of  modern  science. 

In  his  Psychology  {de  Anima)  Aristotle  maintained 
that  soul  is  present  in  all  living  things.  It  is  merely 
intuitive  in  plants;  in  animals  it  is  nutritive  and  sensi¬ 
tive  and  may  also  be  appetitive  and  motive;  in  man, 
soul,  besides  possessing  the  foregoing  characteristics,  is 
intellectual.  The  Metaphysics  derives  its  name  from 
its  position  in  his  works,  coming  as  it  did  after  the 
Physics .  It  deals  with  the  four  causes:  formal  (form) , 
material  (matter),  efficient  (moving),  and  final  (the 
good).  Plato’s  Theory  of  Ideas  was  not  accepted  by 
Aristotle. 

The  Ethics  is  called  Nicomachean  after  Aristotle’s 
son  Nicomachus,  who  is  thought  to  have  edited  them, 
to  distinguish  the  work  from  the  Eudemian  Ethics, 
written  by  Eudemus  on  the  basis  of  Aristotle’s  teach¬ 
ing.  The  basis  of  the  ethics  of  Aristotle  is  practical. 
His  object  was  not  to  distinguish  the  right  and  the 
wrong  nor  to  lay  down  rules  of  morality,  but  to  deter¬ 
mine  the  best  and  most  desirable  scheme  of  life.  The 
aim  of  life  is  happiness  or  well-being.  He  will  attain 
happiness  who,  possessing  external  goods,  lives  and  dies 
in  virtue.  Virtue  lies  in  the  “  golden  mean,”  in  “  noth¬ 
ing  to  excess  ”  and  is  a  habit  of  the  soul,  not,  as  Plato 
taught,  the  result  of  knowledge.  Of  virtue  there  are 
two  kinds  —  moral  and  intellectual.  Of  the  Moral 
Virtues  the  chief  are  temperance,  justice,  courage, 
gentleness,  liberality,  munificence,  self-respect,  and 
magnanimity.  The  Intellectual  Virtues  are  practical 
judgment,  speculative  wisdom,  and  reason.  Man’s 
highest  good  is  philosophy,  or  the  life  of  contemplation, 
although  the  philosopher  will  be  a  good  citizen. 

In  the  Politics,  Aristotle  discusses  the  happiness  or 


246 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


well-being  of  the  community,  as  in  the  Ethics  he  dealt 
with  the  individual  well-being.  From  the  family  as  a 
social  unit  comes  the  clan-village;  from  the  village, 
the  complex  polls .  For  the  government  of  the  polls 
there  are  a  number  of  polities  or  constitutions  possible, 
of  which  some  are  good  (e.g.,  aristocracy,  monarchy, 
and  polity  proper)  where  the  government  rules  for  the 
good  of  the  community,  while  others  are  bad — e.g., 
democracy,  oligarchy,  and  tyranny  —  as  being  perver¬ 
sions,  the  reverse  of  the  good.  Aristotle  believes  that 
the  best  government  would  result  from  the  exercise  of 
absolute  power  by  one  superior  person,  or  more  than 
one,  in  the  interests  of  all,  although  this  government 
is  not  to  be  achieved.  His  ideal  state  is,  therefore, 
aristocratic,  small,  and  autonomous.  Plato’s  ideal 
commonwealth  as  outlined  in  the  Republic  is  rejected, 
and  cogent  arguments  and  objections  are  directed 
against  his  teacher’s  proposed  institutions. 

The  Constitution  of  Athens ,  the  papyrus  manuscript 
of  which  was  first  published  in  1891,  is  a  description 
of  the  Athenian  polity,  and  is  of  great  interest  and 
importance  to  students  of  Greek  history  and  constitu¬ 
tional  law. 

The  rhetorical  works  of  Aristotle  are  well-known 
and  long  have  exerted  profound  influence.  In  the 
Rhetoric  we  have  the  first  real  treatment  of  the  sub¬ 
ject  as  an  Art,  namely,  the  Art  of  Persuasion.  Book  I 
discusses  the  kinds  of  proof  and  the  three  types  of 
rhetoric,  — deliberative,  judicial,  and  epideictic.  Book 

II  deals  with  the  psychology  of  the  audience,  and  Book 

III  with  style  and  arrangement. 

In  the  Poetics ,  the  first  formal  treatment  of  poetry, 
Aristotle  essayed  to  define,  analyse,  and  discuss  the 
chief  kinds  of  poetry.  The  work,  as  we  have  it,  is  in¬ 
complete.  To  Aristotle,  the  greatest  of  the  arts  is 
poetry,  and  the  highest  form  of  poetry  is  tragedy.  A 
tragedy  he  defines  as  “  imitation  of  an  action  that  is 
serious,  complete,  and  of  a  certain  magnitude;  in  lan- 


PHILOSOPHY 


247 


guage  embellished  ...  in  the  form  of  action,  not  nar¬ 
rative;  through  pity  and  fear  effecting  the  proper  purga¬ 
tion  of  the  emotions.”  The  parts  of  tragedy  are  six: 
plot,  character,  diction,  thought,  scenery,  and  song. 
The  Oedipus  Tyrannus  of  Sophocles  is  Aristotle’s  fa¬ 
vorite  play  for  illustrative  purposes.  With  regard  to 
the  so-called  three  unities,  which  are  now  generally 
believed  to  have  rigidly  bound  and  constrained  the 
Greek  dramatist,  we  may  note  that  Aristotle  does  not 
even  mention  the  unity  of  place,  nor  does  he  lay  down 
any  hard  and  fast  rule  relative  to  the  unity  of  time, 
except  to  state  that  the  limit  of  a  tragedy  should  be  a 
single  revolution  of  the  sun  or  only  a  little  longer. 
Unity  of  action  alone  he  insists  upon,  in  that  every 
part  of  the  plot  of  a  play  must  be  necessary  to  the 
whole. 

These  are  the  extant  works  of  Aristotle,  but  we  know 
that  he  wrote,  or  inspired,  many  more.  The  writings 
we  possess  are  in  form  incomplete  and  the  style  is  gen¬ 
erally  devoid  of  charm.  It  is  evident  that  they  are  un¬ 
revised  and  had  not  been  prepared  for  publication.  In 
fact,  it  is  probable  that  some  of  the  treatises  are  but 
the  lecture  notes  of  the  philosopher  or  the  notes  taken 
by  his  pupils,  Aristotle’s  knowledge  was  immense, 
likewise  his  ability  to  classify  and  to  interpret.  He 
stands  forth  as  a  giant  among  the  world’s  great  thinkers 
and  his  influence  upon  all  subsequent  thought  is  in¬ 
calculable. 


III.  The  Post-Aristotelians 

As  we  have  observed,  Socrates  himself  founded  no 
college,  no  permanent  school  of  formal  philosophy. 
But  numerous  schools  sprang  from  his  teaching  and 
influence.  We  have  already  discussed  the  Academy  of 
Plato  and  the  Lyceum  of  Aristotle.  It  remains  to  con¬ 
sider  several  prominent  schools  of  thought,  which  were 
destined  to  sway  the  thinking  of  the  world  for  centuries. 
The  founders  of  these  schools  largely  discarded  the 


248 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


method  of  dialectic  dear  to  Socrates  and  Plato;  nor 
were  they  in  sympathy  with  the  idealistic  speculation 
and  the  theories  of  their  predecessors.  They  empha¬ 
sized,  however,  the  ethical  doctrines  of  Socrates  and 
busied  themselves  with  the  elaboration  and  the  enun¬ 
ciation  of  practical  ethical  creeds,  practical  philoso¬ 
phies,  by  which  men  might  live  to  best  advantage. 

The  earliest  of  the  Socratic  schools  were  those  of  the 
Cyrenaics  and  the  Cynics .  The  Cyrenaics  were  founded 
by  Aristippus,  a  pupil  of  Socrates,  of  the  city  of  Cyrene, 
a  rich  and  populous  Greek  colony  on  the  coast  of  Africa. 
Aristippus  rejected  the  Socratic  dictum  that  virtue  is 
knowledge  and  the  greatest  good.  Happiness,  he  as¬ 
serted,  was  the  chief  end  of  man.  Pleasure,  he  held, 
must  be  sought.  Knowledge  results  from  sensation. 
The  teachings  of  Aristippus  had  great  influence  upon 
the  doctrines  of  the  Epicureans  and  the  Hedonists,  but 
it  should  be  noted  that  the  Epicureans,  unlike  the 
Cyrenaics,  believed  in  the  Socratic  pleasures  of  the 
mind,  while  the  Hedonists  went  far  beyond  the  Cyre¬ 
naics  in  the  emphasis  placed  upon  the  pleasures  of  the 
senses. 

The  Cynics  probably  received  their  name  originally 
from  the  fact  that  the  founder  of  the  school,  Antis- 
thenes,  a  pupil  of  Socrates,  taught  in  the  gymnasium 
of  Cynosarges,  just  outside  Athens.  Near  this  site  the 
American  School  of  Classical  Studies  is  now  located. 
The  name  Cynosarges  means  “  of  the  White  Hound.” 
Popular  feeling,  however,  early  derived  the  name 
“  Cynic  ”  directly  from  the  Greek  word  for  “  dog,”  be¬ 
cause  of  the  snarling,  contemptuous,  and  disagreeable 
nature  of  certain  of  the  members  of  the  school,  in  par¬ 
ticular,  Diogenes.  Thus  the  English  word  “  cynic  ”  has 
come  to  mean  a  sneering  fault-finder.  The  Cynics 
denied  that  wealth  and  pleasure  are  to  be  desired. 
Virtue  is  the  supreme  end  and  is  won  through  self- 
denial,  poverty,  and  self-sufficiency,  which  lead  to  in¬ 
dependence  of  intellect.  Here  we  have  the  germs  of 
Stoicism.  These  doctrines,  to  be  sure,  point  the  way 


PHILOSOPHY 


249 


to  asceticism,  which  was  practiced  by  the  notorious 
Cynic,  Diogenes  of  Sinope  (412-323  b.c.).  Many 
stories  are  told  of  this  eccentric  person  —  how  he  lived 
in  a  tub  (really,  jar)  and  destroyed  his  only  wooden 
bowl  when  he  saw  a  peasant  youth  drinking  from  his 
hands.  Famous,  too,  is  the  story  of  his  supposed  inter¬ 
view  with  Alexander  at  the  festival  of  the  Isthmian 
games,  when  Diogenes  craved  of  the  great  Macedonian 
a  single  boon  —  that  Alexander  would  not  stand  be¬ 
tween  him  and  the  sun.  To  which  Alexander  is  said 
to  have  replied:  “  If  I  were  not  Alexander,  I  would  be 
Diogenes.” 

The  Stoic  school  of  philosophy  was  founded  by  Zeno, 
who  was  born  in  336  b.c.  The  name  of  the  school 
comes  from  its  place  of  meeting,  the  Painted  Stoa,  a 
colonnade  on  the  north  side  of  the  Athenian  market¬ 
place,  which  was  adorned  with  mural  paintings  of  Tro¬ 
jan  scenes  by  the  great  painter  Polygnotus.  Although 
Stoicism  was  first  taught  in  Athens,  its  founder  was  of 
Cyprus  and  of  Phoenician  descent;  its  devotees  were 
Hellenistic  Greeks  rather  than  Hellenes  proper  and  its 
stronghold  came  to  be  Rome,  not  Athens.  The  tenets 
of  the  practical  Stoic  belief  were  such  as  to  appeal  to 
the  grave  Roman  character  and  temperament.  Promi¬ 
nent  among  the  Greek  teachers  and  interpreters  of 
Stoicism  were  Cleanthes,  Chrysippus,  and  Panaetius. 
At  Rome,  the  Stoic  philosophy,  which  was  the  religion, 
in  theory  at  least,  of  all  noble  and  educated  Romans 
for  several  centuries,  was  expounded  by  such  great 
thinkers  and  writers  as  Seneca,  Cornutus,  Persius, 
Lucan,  Epictetus,  and  Marcus  Aurelius. 

The  chief  doctrines  of  the  moral  philosophy  of 
Stoicism  very  briefly  stated  are  these:  Virtue,  to  the 
wise  man,  is  the  highest  good.  Fixed  laws  govern  the 
Universe  and  these  laws  express  the  world-soul,  of 
which  the  human  soul  is  a  part.  Goodness  is  to  be 
found  in  the  true  knowledge  of  nature,  and  this  knowl¬ 
edge  is  to  be  won  by  reason.  Wisdom  consists  in  living 
in  accord  with  nature.  The  wise  man  is  self-sufficient. 


250 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Self-control,  therefore,  is  of  paramount  importance. 
Serenity  of  mind  is  essential,  whether  in  pleasure  or 
pain.  Unlike  the  Cyrenaics  and  the  Epicureans,  the 
Stoics  denied  that  pleasure  should  be  sought;  if  it  comes 
it  is  merely  a  concomitant  of  virtuous  conduct. 

The  Epicurean  school  was  founded  by  Epicurus 
(342-270  b.c.),  of  Athenian  parentage,  who  bought  a 
garden  in  Athens,  where  he  established  a  philosophic 
school  and  taught  a  philosophic  system  which  won  a 
great  following  and  was  destined  to  have  wide-reaching 
influence.  Only  scanty  fragments  of  his  numerous 
works  have  come  down  to  us  and  we  are  largely  de¬ 
pendent  for  our  knowledge  of  his  life  and  philosophy 
upon  his  biographer,  Diogenes  Laertius,  and  upon  the 
great  philosophical  poem,  De  Rerum  Natura  of  his 
Roman  admirer  Lucretius. 

Epicureanism,  like  Stoicism,  was  more  practical  than 
speculative  and  was  concerned  with  ethics  more  than 
with  physics  and  logic.  In  physics,  Epicurus  followed 
Democritus  in  the  atomic  theory,  as  he  believed  that 
the  universe  consists  of  atoms  and  void;  the  atoms  are 
without  limit  as  to  number,  indestructible  and  indi¬ 
visible,  and  are  in  perpetual  motion  in  the  void,  “  the 
illimitable  inane.”  There  are  numerous  worlds  in  the 
universe.  The  gods  exist,  it  is  true,  in  a  realm  of  their 
own,  but  they  do  not  concern  themselves  with  hu¬ 
manity,  nor  do  they  rule  the  world.  Consequently 
man  should  free  his  soul  of  all  religious  fear  and  super¬ 
stition,  and  likewise  of  the  terror  of  death.  The  soul, 
itself  corporeal,  perishes  with  the  body,  for  death  ends 
all.  Sensation  is  alone  to  be  trusted,  for  it  is  only 
through  the  senses  that  reality  and  the  truth  may  be 
ascertained.  Happiness  is  the  chief  end  of  life,  and 
pleasure  consists  of  pleasant  sensations.  But  by  this 
Epicurus  did  not  mean  sensuality  —  this  is  Hedonism. 
We  must  be  on  our  guard  lest  we  mistakenly  accept  the 
modern  meaning  of  the  word  epicurean ,  i.e.,  “  given  to 
luxury  or  indulgence  in  sensual  pleasures,  especially  in 
eating  and  drinking,”  as  correctly  characterizing  the 


PHILOSOPHY 


251 


teachings  and  the  practice  of  Epicurus  and  his  school. 
Happiness,  said  Epicurus,  was  to  be  achieved  through 
freedom  from  disturbance,  by  the  living  of  a  simple  life, 
and  by  choosing  only  those  pleasures  which  bring  real 
and  permanent  contentment  to  mind  and  body.  Wis¬ 
dom  enables  us  to  make  the  proper  choice. 

Epicurus  was  a  man  of  simple  and  temperate  life 
and  of  attractive  personality,  and  inspired  love  and 
veneration  in  his  numerous  disciples.  His  philosophy 
unchanged  lived  after  him,  and,  about  150  b.c.,  was 
established  at  Rome  where  it  won  wide  repute.  As 
has  been  said,  Lucretius  was  his  Roman  disciple  and 
interpreter  in  a  poem  of  great  power  and  remarkable 
poetic  excellence.  Horace,  in  his  thinking,  was  largely 
Epicurean.  In  fact,  in  the  first  century  a.d.,  the  pre¬ 
vailing  philosophy  at  Rome  was  Epicurean  in  practice, 
although  Stoic  in  theory.  In  the  second  century  a.d., 
a  chair  of  Epicureanism  (along  with  Stoic,  Platonist, 
and  Peripatetic  Chairs)  was  established  by  Marcus 
Aurelius. 

Amid  the  discordant  doctrines  of  these  many  schools 
as  above  outlined  it  is  not  surprising  that  the  spirit  of 
scepticism,  the  germs  of  which  are  to  be  found  in  the 
teachings  of  the  Sophists,  grew  until  it  materialized 
into  a  definite  school,  that  of  the  Sceptics ,  founded  by 
Pyrrho  of  Elis  (born  about  365  b.c.),  who  held  that 
truth  is  unattainable  and  dogmatism  must  be  rejected. 
Happiness  alone  is  the  chief  good,  and  this  happiness, 
consisting  of  tranquillity  or  mental  imperturbability, 
is  attainable  through  an  attitude  of  indifference  to  all 
things. 

The  scope  of  this  volume  forbids  us  to  carry  further 
the  sketch  of  the  late  Greek  philosophic  schools,  their 
subsequent  influence,  and  their  relation  to  Christianity. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

RELIGION 


“  What  has  the  religion  of  the  Greeks  to  teach  us  that  we  are 
most  in  danger  of  forgetting?  In  a  word,  it  is  the  faith  that 
Truth  is  our  friend,  and  that  the  knowledge  of  Truth  is  not 
beyond  our  reach.”  —  W.  R.  Inge. 

WHAT  was  the  religious  belief  and  what  were 
the  religious  practices  of  the  Athenians  of 
the  fifth  and  fourth  centuries  b.c.?  To  an¬ 
swer  these  questions  completely  is  impossible;  even  to 
answer  them  satisfactorily  is  difficult.  In  truth,  the 
same  difficulty  confronts  any  inquirer  into  the  nature 
of  the  religion  of  any  people  of  any  period  or  land, 
because  an  inherited  religious  tradition,  the  result  of 
the  mingling  of  diverse  elements  which  are  of  manifold 
and  obscure  origins,  is  inevitably  complex.  It  is  not 
easy,  furthermore,  to  separate  religion  as  such  from 
mythology,  and  especially  is  this  true  in  the  case  of  the 
religion  of  the  Greeks,  a  people  without  dogmatic  reli¬ 
gion,  but  the  possessors  of  a  rich  and  imaginative  my¬ 
thology.  To  us,  religion  is  based  primarily  upon  in¬ 
timate  relationship  between  man  and  God,  but  to  the 
Greek  this  relationship  was  not  felt  as  something  con¬ 
stantly  present  which  at  every  moment  profoundly 
affected  his  happiness  in  this  world  and  in  the  life  here¬ 
after.  Then,  too,  the  degrees  and  kinds  of  religious 
faith  and  belief  may  be  as  numerous  as  individuals, 
depending  upon  the  intellect,  the  imagination,  the 
education,  and  the  environment  of  the  individual. 
Again,  even  in  a  given  person,  religious  belief  is  often 
subject  to  change.  Nor  were  the  religious  beliefs  and 
ideas  of  Plato,  Socrates,  or  Euripides  in  all  particulars 
identical  with  those  of  the  average  Athenian.  Our  task, 

252 


RELIGION 


253 


too,  is  made  more  difficult  by  the  fact  that  the  Greeks, 
unlike  so  many  other  peoples,  had  no  Bible,  no  sacred 
writings,  and  no  formulated  religious  dogma.  In  con¬ 
sequence  of  these  factors  perhaps  the  best  approach 
to  this  subject  will  be  to  give  a  brief  historical  sketch 
of  Greek  religious  thought  and  teaching.  A  fuller 
treatment  will  be  found  in  Professor  C.  H.  Moore’s 
The  Religious  Thought  of  the  Greeks. 

It  was  natural,  and  indeed  inevitable,  that  the  writ¬ 
ings  of  early  poets  and  thinkers,  especially  Homer  and 
Hesiod,  should  powerfully  affect  and  largely  determine 
Athenian  religious  thought.  These  great  poets  were 
regarded  by  the  Athenians  not  primarily  as  literary 
artists,  whose  chief  value  was  their  contribution  to 
aesthetic  pleasure,  but  they  were  venerated  rather  as 
inspired  teachers  and  preceptors,  whose  utterances  were 
of  profound  moral  value. 

Since  the  study  and  memorizing  of  Homer  and 
Hesiod  formed  the  very  backbone  of  all  instruction,  it 
was  from  this  source  that  the  Athenians  gained  their 
prevalent  conceptions  with  respect  to  cosmogony,  the 
genealogy  and  the  relationships  of  the  gods,  anthropo¬ 
morphism,  forms  of  worship,  and  views  of  the  future 
world.  It  is  true  that  Xenophanes,  Plato,  and  Eu¬ 
ripides  repudiated  certain  teachings  of  Homer  and  the 
early  poets,  but  it  is  probable  that  popular  belief  was 
little  influenced  by  their  protests. 

In  the  poetry  of  Homer  we  find  that  the  gods  are 
made  in  man’s  image,  although  they  are  superhuman 
and  immortal.  They  possess  great  power  and  may  in 
varied  ways  profoundly  affect  human  destinies,  yet 
they  are  themselves  subject  to  Fate,  are  not  omnipo¬ 
tent  or  omniscient,  and  can  suffer  pain  and  humiliation. 
Ambrosia  and  nectar,  not  human  sustenance,  supply 
their  nourishment,  and  ichor,  not  blood,  courses  in  their 
veins.  The  gods,  according  to  Homer,  are  all  too  hu¬ 
man,  however,  in  that  they  are  subject  to  passion  and 
show  frailty,  as  evidenced  by  their  quarrels,  jealousy, 


254 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


and  misconduct.  The  functions  and  prerogatives  of 
the  chief  deities  are  thus  defined  by  Homer. 

Zeus  is  father  of  gods  and  men,  and  is  lord  of  the 
Olympians:  Hera  is  his  wife.  Apollo,  the  archer  god, 
is  lord  of  the  lyre,  a  giver  of  inspiration  to  prophets, 
and  a  patron  of  war.  Artemis,  the  huntress,  is  his  sister. 
Athena  is  patroness  of  handicraft,  and  is  also  inter¬ 
ested  in  war.  Ares,  however,  is  the  chief  god  of  war¬ 
fare,  Aphrodite  of  love,  Hephaestus  of  fire,  and  Po¬ 
seidon  of  the  sea.  Hermes  is  messenger  god.  The 
chief  virtues,  according  to  Homer,  are  those  which  were 
universally  esteemed  among  the  Greeks  —  the  keeping 
of  an  oath,  reverence  for  parents,  and  observance  of 
hospitality.  Soul  and  body  are  not  clearly  differen¬ 
tiated.  At  death  the  soul  departs  to  Hades  where,  in 
gloom  and  sadness,  it  exists  as  the  mere  wraith  and 
image  of  the  living  man,  although  retaining,  in  excep¬ 
tional  cases,  consciousness. 

Hesiod,  in  his  Theogony ,  a  genealogical  epic,  re¬ 
vealed  the  dynasties  of  the  gods,  showing  that  Uranus 
and  Cronos  had  preceded  Zeus.  In  his  Works  and 
Days ,  many  myths  are  related,  such  as  the  story  of  the 
creation  of  Pandora  and  her  fateful  jar,  whence  es¬ 
caped  the  diseases  and  evils  of  this  world,  and  the  tale 
of  the  Islands  of  the  Blest,  where  the  happy  heroes 
dwell  forever.  To  Hesiod,  too,  we  are  indebted  for  the 
myth  of  the  Five  Ages  of  Man.  First  came  the  Golden 
Age,  under  Cronos,  when  men  lived  like  gods,  knowing 
neither  toil  nor  misery,  with  hearts  free  from  care. 
Wretched  age  weighed  not  on  them  and  when  they  died 
it  was  as  though  they  were  overcome  by  sleep  and  hav¬ 
ing  become  spirits  they  served  thenceforth  as  guardians 
of  mortal  men.  Next,  under  Zeus,  was  the  Silver  Age. 
The  men  of  this  Age,  less  noble,  were  destroyed  for 
their  sins  and  impiety.  Third  came  the  Age  of  Bronze, 
a  generation  of  lovers  of  war  and  violence,  with  armor, 
weapons,  and  houses  of  bronze.  These  men  were  de¬ 
stroyed  by  their  own  hands  and  nameless  went  to  the 
dank  house  of  chill  Hades.  Fourth  in  the  sequence 


RELIGION 


2  55 


was  the  Age  of  Heroes,  a  god-like  race  of  hero-men  who 
are  called  the  demi-gods.  Some  of  these  died  at  Thebes 
and  at  Troy;  to  others  Zeus  gave  happy  lives  in  an 
abode  apart  from  men  in  the  Isles  of  the  Blessed.  The 
last  and  fifth  generation  is  that  of  Iron,  the  age  of 
Hesiod  himself,  who  exclaims,  “  Would  that  I  were  not 
of  this  generation,  but  either  had  died  before  or  been 
born  later!  Now  truly  is  a  race  of  iron;  men  never 
cease  from  toil  and  sorrow  by  day,  nor  from  perishing 
by  night,  and  the  gods  shall  give  them  grievous  cares. 
The  father  will  not  agree  with  his  children,  nor  the 
children  with  their  father,  nor  guest  with  host,  nor 
friend  with  friend.  Men  will  dishonor  their  parents 
as  they  quickly  grow  old.  Might  shall  make  right, 
and  one  man  will  sack  another’s  city.  Envy  of  evil 
name,  delighting  in  evil,  with  loathsome  countenance, 
will  accompany  wretched  men.  And  then  Reverence 
and  Nemesis,  their  lovely  forms  garbed  in  white,  will 
depart  from  the  earth  and  abandon  men,  to  be  with  the 
race  of  the  immortals.  Grievous  woes  will  be  left  for 
mortals  and  there  will  be  no  defence  against  evil.” 

In  general,  the  Works  and  Days  marks  an  advance  in 
religious  thought,  as  it  is  moral  in  its  teaching,  and  in¬ 
sists  upon  the  excellence  and  benefit  of  work,  the  neces¬ 
sity  of  the  observance  of  justice,  the  desirability  of 
human  concord,  and  the  obligation  of  piety  towards 
the  gods. 

Of  the  lyric  poets,  Pindar,  who  was  doubtless  in¬ 
fluenced  by  the  Orphic  doctrines  later  to  be  discussed, 
proclaims  the  morality  of  the  gods  and  asserts  the  hap¬ 
piness  after  death  of  those  who  have  kept  the  faith. 
In  the  Second  Olympian  Ode  he  sings:  “  The  good, 
having  the  sun  shining  for  evermore,  for  equal  nights 
and  equal  days,  receive  the  boon  of  a  life  of  lightened 
toil,  not  vexing  the  soil  with  the  strength  of  their  hands, 
no,  nor  the  water  of  the  sea,  to  gain  a  scanty  livelihood ; 
but,  in  the  presence  of  the  honoured  gods,  all  who  were 
wont  to  rejoice  in  keeping  their  oaths,  share  a  life  that 


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knoweth  no  tears,  while  the  others  endure  labour  that 
none  can  look  upon.”  (Translation  by  Sandys.) 

It  is,  however,  in  the  three  great  Athenian  tragedians 
that  we  find  most  frequent  and  fullest  utterance  con¬ 
cerning  questions  of  religion  and  morality.  The  plays 
of  Aeschylus,  the  earliest  of  the  tragedians,  are  espe¬ 
cially  permeated  with  religious  and  moral  teaching.  In 
fact,  the  trilogy  called  the  Oresteia  (the  Agamemnon , 
Libation-Bearers ,  and  Eumenides )  may  be  regarded  in 
a  sense  as  sermons  expounding  the  text  that  the  “  sin¬ 
ner  must  pay  the  penalty.”  And  this  penalty,  as  in  the 
old  Hebraic  conception,  pursues  a  guilty  line  and  may 
be  visited  upon  the  children.  In  the  tragedies  of 
Aeschylus  there  is  strongly  emphasized  the  idea  of 
Moira  (Fate),  of  Ate  (the  infatuation  of  the  sinner 
that  leads  him  on  to  ruin),  and  of  Nemesis  (Heaven’s 
punishment  falling  upon  those  who  are  guilty  of  Hybris , 
or  arrogant  insolence  and  excess  in  word,  in  thought, 
in  deed).  These  ideas,  to  be  sure,  especially  that  of 
Nemesis,  are  found  elsewhere  in  Greek  literature,  as 
for  example,  in  the  history  of  Herodotus,  who  repre¬ 
sents  the  Persians,  extravagant  of  word  and  deed,  as 
meeting  a  just  doom  for  their  overweening  conduct, 
struck  down  in  all  their  vain  and  insolent  pride  by 
Nemesis.  In  Aeschylus  there  is  truly  a  divine  order 
ruling  the  cosmos  and  Zeus,  at  length,  is  supreme. 

Sophocles,  too,  is  a  religious  poet,  but  ideas  of  this 
character  are  not  put  so  strongly  in  the  foreground  as 
in  Aeschylus.  Yet  all  through  his  plays,  interwoven  in 
the  warp  and  woof  of  their  fabric,  are  his  conceptions 
of  piety,  of  humility,  of  sophrosyne  (the  golden  mean), 
and  of  reverence.  In  the  Antigone,  King  Creon  indig¬ 
nantly  asks  the  heroine:  “  And  didst  thou  indeed  dare 
to  transgress  that  law  ”  (i.e.,  so  as  to  give  holy  rites  of 
burial  to  her  brother,  the  so-called  traitor,  Polynices)? 
Antigone  replies:  “  Yes:  for  it  was  not  Zeus  that  had 
published  me  that  edict;  not  such  are  the  laws  set 
among  men  by  the  Justice  who  dwells  with  the  gods 
below;  nor  deemed  I  that  thy  decrees  were  of  such 


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257 


force,  that  a  mortal  could  over-ride  the  unwritten  and 
unfailing  statutes  of  heaven.  For  their  life  is  not  of 
today  or  yesterday,  but  from  all  time,  and  no  man 
knows  when  they  were  first  put  forth  ”  (Jebb). 

Moving,  too,  is  the  prayer  of  the  Chorus  in  the 
Oedipus  Tyr annus: 

Toward  God’s  great  mysteries,  oh,  let  me  move 
Unstained  till  I  die 

In  speech  or  doing;  for  the  Laws  thereof 
Are  holy,  walkers  upon  ways  above, 

Born  in  the  far  blue  sky; 

Their  father  is  Olympus  uncreate; 

No  man  hath  made  nor  told 
Their  being;  neither  shall  Oblivion  set 
Sleep  on  their  eyes,  for  in  them  lives  a  great 
Spirit  and  grows  not  old. 

—  G.  Murray. 

In  the  Electra  the  Chorus  thus  consoles  the  impa¬ 
tient  and  suffering  heroine:  “  Courage,  my  daughter, 
courage;  great  still  in  heaven  is  Zeus,  who  sees  and 
governs  all:  to  him  commit  thy  bitter  wrath.” 

Neither  in  Aeschylus  nor  in  Sophocles  do  we  find  a 
clearly  expressed  idea  of  immortality,  although  the  lat¬ 
ter,  in  a  fragment,  affirms  future  happiness  for  those 
who  have  been  initiated  into  the  Eleusinian  Mysteries. 

Euripides,  although  a  contemporary  of  Sophocles, 
seems  to  belong  to  a  new  age  in  religious  thought.  He 
is  a  pronounced  sceptic  of  much  in  the  old  mythology 
and  rejects  as  improbable  many  of  the  current  stories 
dealing  with  the  misconduct  of  the  gods.  In  an  inter¬ 
esting  and  important  fragment  (294),  he  says:  “If 
the  gods  do  aught  that  is  base,  then  they  are  not  gods.” 
Again,  in  the  Iphigenia  among  the  Taurians  (391),  the 
heroine  declares:  “  I  think  no  one  of  the  gods  is  evil.” 
Often  we  see  Euripides  in  efforts  to  rationalize.  An 
interesting  example  is  his  treatment  of  the  Erinyes 
(Furies).  In  the  Eumenides  of  Aeschylus  the  Furies, 
who  were  in  pursuit  of  the  guilty  Orestes,  were  repre¬ 
sented  as  actual  persons,  members  of  the  chorus,  in 
fact,  dread  women  of  haggard  countenance  and  snaky 


258 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


locks.  But  Euripides,  in  the  Iphigenia  among  the 
Taurians ,  conceives  them,  in  modern  fashion,  as  but 
terrifying  hallucinations  of  a  guilty  conscience  and  a 
temporarily  disordered  mind.  Euripides  was  an  ardent 
pupil  of  the  Sophists  and  the  philosophers  of  his  day 
and  their  teachings  and  influence  in  general  are  clearly 
reflected  in  his  plays.  He  is,  therefore,  a  product  of  a 
new  period  in  Athenian  thought,  a  time  of  transition, 
when  the  beliefs  and  the  habits  of  men  had  been  un¬ 
settled  by  the  rapidly  changing  social  and  political  en¬ 
vironment  of  the  closing  years  of  the  fifth  century. 

Besides  the  poets  and  the  playwrights  there  were 
certain  other  agencies  at  work  which  were  of  potent 
influence  in  affecting  Athenian  religious  belief  in  the 
Age  of  Pericles.  These  agencies  were  the  Orphic  doc¬ 
trines,  the  Eleusinian  Mysteries,  and  the  speculations 
and  teachings  of  the  philosophers  and  the  Sophists. 

Orphism  was  a  product  of  the  sixth  century  b.c.  and 
originated  in  connection  with  the  worship  of  the  god 
Dionysus.  It  was  Orpheus,  the  mythical,  magical 
Thracian  lyre-player,  who  was  credited  with  having 
modified  and  rearranged  the  Bacchic  rites.  Accurate 
and  complete  information  of  the  origin  of  Orphism,  its 
history,  its  ritual,  and  its  influence  is  unfortunately  lack¬ 
ing.  But  of  its  general  character  we  are  certain. 
Orphism  was  a  religion  of  mysticism;  the  beliefs  and 
practices  of  this  sect,  so  divergent  in  many  particulars 
from  current  religion,  are  remarkable.  Pantheism,  and 
not  polytheism,  was  at  its  basis.  The  body  was  re¬ 
garded  as  an  impeding  material  element  imprisoning 
the  soul,  which  was  divine  and  immortal.  The  Orphic 
sect  believed  in  the  idea  of  prenatal  sin  and  the  possi¬ 
bility  of  redemption  or  atonement.  Salvation  was  open 
to  initiates  only.  Transmigration  of  souls  was  likewise 
a  feature  of  the  belief.  It  was  thought  that  at  death 
the  soul  went  to  Hades  to  be  reborn  into  another  body, 
and  that  the  cycle  caused  by  sin  might  be  shortened  by 
virtuous  conduct,  by  the  practice  of  vegetarianism,  and, 


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259 


in  short,  by  the  observance  of  an  elaborate  ritual,  which 
seems  to  have  had  its  origin  in  Crete  and  in  Asia  Minor, 
especially  Phrygia.  The  exact  destination  and  lot  of 
the  finally  purified  soul  are  unknown,  but  blessedness 
and  eternal  happiness  resulted.  The  members  of  the 
Orphic  cult  were  not  numerous  in  the  classical  period 
and  failed  to  make  any  wide-spread  popular  appeal, 
although  the  direct  or  indirect  influence  of  these  strik¬ 
ing  doctrines  was  considerable,  and  may  be  seen  in  the 
Odes  of  Pindar,  the  dramas  of  Euripides,  and  especially 
in  the  schools  of  Pythagoras  and  Empedocles,  and  in 
the  philosophy  of  Plato. 

There  are  many  striking  aspects  of  Orphism  which 
seem  to  anticipate  later  beliefs  and  practices,  especially 
Christian.  Orpheus  himself,  as  leader  of  wild  animals, 
is  as  Christ,  shepherd  of  his  flock.  The  doctrines  of 
prenatal  sin,  of  the  necessity  of  purification  and  re¬ 
demption  and  the  pursuit  of  spiritual  excellence,  the 
belief  in  future  life,  the  hope  of  immortality,  the  possi¬ 
bility  of  becoming  one  with  the  divine  through  purity 
—  these  are,  indeed,  remarkable  doctrines,  but  the  cult 
was  unable  to  do  more  than  to  tinge  the  main  stream 
of  Hellenic  religion.  Orphism  in  its  nature  was  not 
calculated  to  make  a  widespread  popular  appeal.  It 
was  hard  for  devotees  of  the  Orphic  sect  themselves  to 
keep  the  faith,  for,  as  Plato  ( Phaedo  69c)  says,  quot¬ 
ing  the  Orphic  text:  “  Many  are  wand-bearers,  few 
Bakchoi.” 

In  the  latter  part  of  the  sixth  century  b.c.  Pythagoras 
established  at  Croton  in  Italy  a  school  of  thought  which 
bore  great  resemblance  to  Orphism.  Pythagoras,  too, 
taught  the  divine  nature  of  the  soul  and  the  necessity 
of  its  purification  and  development  through  ethical  dis¬ 
cipline  and  a  careful  regimen.  For  example,  meat, 
beans,  and  woolen  garments  were  taboo.  But  Pytha¬ 
goras  emphasized  the  intellectual  side  of  Orphism 
rather  than  the  emotional,  and  stressed  the  value  of 
number  and  harmony. 


260 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Another  extremely  important  influence  in  connection 
with  Athenian  religion  were  the  Eleusinian  Mysteries. 
These  rites,  annually  celebrated  in  the  fall  at  Eleusis 
in  Attica,  were  held  in  honor  of  the  goddess  Demeter, 
earth-mother  and  goddess  of  grain,  and  her  daughter 
Persephone  (Kore).  The  initiates  of  the  Mysteries 
were  sworn  to  secrecy  and  for  the  most  part  they  have 
kept  the  vow  so  faithfully  that  we  are  baffled  in  ob¬ 
taining  complete  or  even  satisfying  information  relative 
to  them.  As  Pausanias  says:  “  My  dream  forbade  me 
to  describe  what  is  within  the  wall  of  the  sanctuary; 
and  surely  it  is  clear  that  the  uninitiated  may  not  law¬ 
fully  hear  of  that  from  the  sight  of  which  they  are 
debarred.” 

The  date  of  the  origin  of  the  Mysteries  is  uncertain. 
They  are  not  mentioned  in  Homer  or  in  Hesiod,  but 
doubtless  are  as  early  as  the  eighth  century  b.c.,  since 
the  interesting  Homeric  Hymn  to  Demeter ,  which  is 
probably  of  the  seventh  century  b.c.,  tells  in  charming 
verse  the  story  of  the  cult  and  its  beginnings.  Perseph¬ 
one,  while  gathering  flowers,  was  carried  away  by 
the  chthonian  god  Hades  (Pluto)  to  his  kingdom  be¬ 
low.  For  nine  days  her  mother  Demeter,  disguised  as 
an  old  woman,  wandered  over  land  and  sea  in  search  of 
her  lost  daughter.  She  came  to  Eleusis  where,  fatigued 
and  distressed,  she  sat  by  a  well.  There  she  was  ac¬ 
costed  by  the  daughters  of  King  Celeus.  Through  their 
influence  Demeter  was  employed  as  nurse  for  the  infant 
prince,  the  son  of  Metaneira  and  Celeus.  That  he 
might  wax  strong,  by  day  she  anointed  him  with  am¬ 
brosia,  and  by  night  she  hid  him  in  the  live  coals  of  the 
fire.  But  the  infant’s  mother,  seeing  this,  cried  aloud 
in  her  fear.  Demeter,  angered,  assumed  her  immortal 
form,  revealed  her  divine  nature,  and  commanded  the 
building  of  a  temple  and  an  altar  and  the  establishment 
of  the  mystic  rites  and  worship  in  her  honor.  Now 
Demeter,  in  her  grief  for  her  daughter,  had  caused  the 
earth  to  remain  barren  and  no  seed  sprouted  in  the  soil 
and  no  fruit  appeared  until,  at  the  behest  of  Zeus, 


RELIGION 


261 


Hades  restored  Persephone  to  her  mother.  But  Per¬ 
sephone  had  eaten  of  the  food  of  the  dead,  the 
pomegranate  seed,  and  must  dwell  in  the  world  below 
for  a  third  of  the  year.  In  the  spring,  however,  she 
might  go  to  the  world  above  and  join  her  mother. 

In  the  words  of  the  Hymn,  Demeter  caused  the  earth 
to  bloom  again  and  “  to  Triptolemus  and  Diodes  the 
charioteer,  and  mighty  Eumolpus,  and  Celeus,  she 
showed  the  manner  of  the  rites,  and  taught  them  her 
goodly  mysteries,  holy  mysteries  which  none  may  vio¬ 
late,  or  search  into,  or  noise  abroad,  for  the  great  curse 
from  the  gods  restrains  the  voice.  Happy  is  he  among 
deathly  men  who  hath  beheld  these  things!  And  he 
that  is  uninitiate,  and  hath  no  lot  in  them,  hath  never 
equal  lot  in  death  beneath  the  murky  gloom.” 

The  origin  of  the  Mysteries  is  doubtless  to  be  found 
in  religious  rites  related  to  agriculture.  In  a  sense,  it 
was  a  harvest  festival. 

The  chief  facts  known  of  the  ritual  may  briefly  be 
given.  In  March  at  Agrae  there  were  held  preliminary 
Lesser  Mysteries  in  honor  of  Persephone  and  Dionysus. 
In  the  autumn,  on  the  thirteenth  of  Boedromion  (Sep¬ 
tember),  the  ceremonies  began;  on  the  fifteenth,  can¬ 
didates  for  initiation  assembled,  and  on  the  sixteenth, 
they,  together  with  their  animals,  the  pigs  which  were 
to  be  sacrificed,  were  purified  by  bathing  in  the  sea. 
Sacrifices  followed  and  on  the  nineteenth  the  procession 
to  Eleusis,  fourteen  miles  distant,  started  over  the  Sa¬ 
cred  Way.  The  worshippers  carried  the  image  of  the 
god  Iacchus  (a  form  of  Dionysus),  and  also  the  sacred 
symbols  which  had  been  brought  from  Eleusis.  At  sun¬ 
set  the  procession  reached  Eleusis,  where  for  three  days 
and  nights  the  festival  was  celebrated  with  sacrifices, 
with  initiations  and  purifications,  and  with  perform¬ 
ances  of  the  sacred  drama.  Important  features  of  the 
ritual  of  purification  were  the  handling  of  the  sacred 
symbols  and  the  drinking,  after  fasting,  of  the  mystic 
kykeon  (barley  meal,  mint  and  water),  even  as  Demeter 
had  done.  The  culmination  of  the  celebration  were 


262 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


the  dramatic  and  religious  rites  performed  in  the  great 
hall  (telesterion) .  The  foundations  of  this  great  reli¬ 
gious  assembly-place,  together  with  many  other  inter¬ 
esting  archeological  discoveries,  have  been  disclosed  by 
the  modern  excavations  at  Eleusis.  Scenes  were  appar¬ 
ently  enacted  picturing  various  episodes  in  the  story 
of  Demeter  and  Persephone  as  told  in  the  hymn  above 
outlined.  Dionysus,  Iacchus,  and  Triptolemus,  as  per¬ 
sonages  in  the  religious  ritual  became  more  important 
in  later  times. 

There  are  many  references  in  the  ancient  writers  to 
the  remarkable  influence  of  the  Mysteries  and  their 
tremendous  emotional  and  personal  appeal.  The  chorus 
of  Aristophanes’  Frogs  (455ft.),  is  composed  of  initi¬ 
ates  who  sing:  “  We  alone  have  the  sun  and  its  gra¬ 
cious  light,  we  who  have  been  initiated  into  the  Mys¬ 
teries  and  have  lived  a  pious  life  toward  strangers  and 
toward  our  own  people.” 

In  a  fragment  (114  [102]  )  from  a  dirge  written  by 
Pindar,  in  memory  of  an  Athenian  who  had  been  initi¬ 
ated  into  the  Mysteries,  we  read:  “  Blessed  is  he  who 
hath  seen  those  things  before  he  goeth  beneath  the 
earth;  for  he  knoweth  the  end  of  mortal  life,  and  the 
beginning  of  that  existence  given  of  God.”  Similarly 
in  Sophocles  (Frag.  719):  “  Thrice  blessed  they  of 
men  who  see  these  mystic  rites  before  they  go  to  Hades’ 
realm.  These  alone  have  life  there,  for  others  there 
all  things  are  evil.”  Isocrates  ( Panegyricus  28)  refers 
to  the  Mysteries  as  “  that  mystic  initiation,  the  par¬ 
takers  of  which  have  hopes  that  are  more  pleasant, 
concerning  both  the  end  of  life  and  all  eternity.” 

One  of  the  most  illuminating  passages  relative  to  the 
Mysteries,  although  it  is  of  late  date,  may  be  quoted:1 
“  Then,  in  the  moment  of  death,  the  soul  is  affected  in 
like  manner,  as  in  the  initiation  into  the  Great  Myster¬ 
ies.  At  first,  there  are  wanderings  and  weary  coursings 
to  and  fro,  and,  until  the  consummation,  a  strange  and 

1  Cited  by  Stobaeus,  Florilegium  120.26;  see  Sandys,  Edition  of  Iso¬ 
crates,  Panegyricus,  28. 


RELIGION 


263 


doubtful  marching  through  the  gloom;  and  then,  at 
the  very  verge  of  that  consummation,  there  comes  a 
blending  of  every  horror,  —  ’tis  all  shivering,  trembling, 
sweating,  and  affrightment ;  and  after  this,  a  wondrous 
light  breaks  forth;  and  the  pure  meadows  and  open 
plains  give  their  welcome  with  minstrelsy  and  dances 
and  the  solemnity  of  hallowed  sounds  and  saintly 
visions,  wherein  he  who  is  now  all-perfect  and  initiated 
obtains  freedom  and  release  at  last.  He  ranges  here 
and  there  engarlanded,  he  revels  in  the  sacred  myster¬ 
ies,  he  shares  the  companionship  of  pure  and  holy  men ; 
and  anon  he  looks  on  earth  and  contemplates  the  un¬ 
initiated  and  unpurified  crowd  of  the  living  —  all  tram¬ 
pled  down  and  huddled  together  in  the  depth  of  mire 
and  mist,  and  abiding  in  their  miseries  through  fear 
of  death  and  through  disbelief  in  the  good  things 
yonder.” 

As  in  Orphism,  so  in  the  Eleusinian  Mysteries,  we  see 
emphasis  placed  on  purification  and  the  purging  of  the 
self  of  sins;  there  is  likewise  an  effort  to  win  redemption 
and  salvation  and  a  belief  in  the  possibility  of  a  happi¬ 
ness  after  death.  Both  Orphism  and  the  Mysteries 
have  obvious  oriental  aspects,  and  both  anticipate  cer¬ 
tain  features  of  Christian  doctrines  and  ritual.  While 
Orphism  met  with  no  popular  response  in  Athens,  the 
interest  in  the  Mysteries  was  constant  and  widespread 
and  was,  furthermore,  fostered  by  official  sanction. 
The  vitality  of  the  Mysteries  is  shown  by  the  fact  that 
the  worship  was  continued  to  the  fourth  century  after 
Christ. 

In  Athens  itself  we  find  the  worship  of  certain  gods 
particularly  emphasized  and,  as  was  generally  the  case 
throughout  Greece,  these  gods  were  her  protecting 
deities.  Just  as  Hera  was  identified  with  Samos  and 
Argos,  Zeus  with  Olympia,  and  Apollo  with  Delos  and 
Delphi,  so  Athena  and  Poseidon  were  especially  vener¬ 
ated  at  Athens.  For,  according  to  the  old  belief,  Athena 
had  given  to  Attica  the  olive,  ever  sacred  to  her,  while 


264 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Poseidon’s  gift  was  the  horse.  The  early  worship  of 
these  gods  at  Athens  is  attested  by  the  myth  which  told 
of  their  contest  for  the  land  of  Attica,  a  tale  which 
found  visible  and  artistic  expression  in  the  sculptured 
group  on  the  western  pediment  of  the  Parthenon.  It 
was  Athena  who  was  the  protecting  deity.  This  god¬ 
dess  granted  increase  to  the  land  and  prosperity  to  the 
people;  in  war,  she  gave  victory,  and  in  peace,  skill  and 
accomplishment  in  the  arts,  especially  handicraft  and 
weaving.  Finally,  Athena  came  to  be  identified  with 
the  Athenian  genius  and  culture,  and  was  venerated 
as  the  goddess  of  wisdom  and  enlightenment,  and 
reason  and  art.  On  the  Acropolis,  the  Parthenon,  the 
Erechtheum  (in  part),  and  the  temple  of  Wingless 
Victory  were  built  in  her  honor,  and  the  two  magnifi¬ 
cent  statues  by  Phidias  were  set  up  to  her  glory.  The 
great  festival  of  the  Panathenaea  was  instituted  and 
celebrated  as  a  form  of  worship  of  the  patron  goddess. 
The  coins  of  Athens  were  adorned,  on  the  obverse,  with 
the  head  of  Athena  and,  on  the  reverse,  with  her  owl. 

The  worship  of  Dionysus  was  a  striking  development 
in  Athenian  religion  in  the  sixth  and  fifth  centuries 
b.c.  Of  no  importance  in  Homer  the  cult  of  Dionysus 
grew  amazingly.  To  native  and  primitive  elements  in 
Greek  religion,  which  recognized  the  divine  aspect  of 
nature  in  respect  to  the  growth  and  the  development 
of  life  and  the  life-spirit,  were  added  the  orgiastic  fea¬ 
tures  of  the  cult  of  the  Thracian  Dionysus.  Thebes 
was  the  early  center  of  his  cult  in  Greece  proper.  At 
Athens,  we  find  that  Dionysus  is  the  god  of  genera¬ 
tion  and  of  wine  and,  in  particular,  of  the  theater  and 
drama. 

Apollo,  a  god  of  very  great  influence  in  other  parts  of 
the  Greek  world,  held  a  place  of  lesser  importance  in 
Athenian  religion,  although  the  festival  of  the  Thar - 
gelia  was  held  in  May  to  honor  him  as  protector  of  the 
crops.  The  gymnasium  of  the  Lyceum  was  located  in 
a  precinct  sacred  to  him.  Athenian  drama  is  full  of 
references  and  prayers  to  Apollo  as  god  of  light,  of 


RELIGION 


265 


healing,  and  of  music.  Chiefly,  however,  as  the  god  of 
Delphi  and  of  oracles  is  Apollo  famous.  Athens,  as 
other  Greek  states,  had  at  Delphi  a  treasure-house 
which  contained  offerings  to  the  god  of  prophecy, 
Athenian  officials  regularly  journeyed  to  Delphi  to  con¬ 
sult  the  oracle,  and  attended  Apollo’s  games  and  festi¬ 
vals  both  at  Delphi  and  Delos.  Artemis,  sister  of 
Apollo,  goddess  of  the  chase  and  of  the  moon,  is  his 
feminine  counterpart. 

Hermes  was  a  god  of  numerous  attributes  and  func¬ 
tions.  In  Homer  regarded  as  herald  and  messenger 
of  the  gods,  he  was  later  identified  with  the  flocks  and 
herds,  with  trade  and  gain,  with  youth,  with  eloquence, 
and  with  the  gymnasia.  He  was  thought  of  as  conduc¬ 
tor  of  the  souls  of  the  dead  to  the  world  below.  The  de¬ 
lightful  Homeric  Hymn  to  Hermes  represents  him  as  a 
precocious  infant,  the  inventor  of  the  lyre  and  the  thief 
of  Apollo’s  cattle.  In  Athens,  his  statue,  usually  com¬ 
posed  only  of  the  head  placed  on  a  rectangular  pillar, 
was  set  up  in  many  public  places,  such  as  cross-roads, 
in  front  of  houses,  and  in  the  stadium.  These  statues 
were  called  Hermae.  The  wholesale  mutilation  of  these 
Hermae  in  Athens  in  413  b.c.,  in  which  affair  Alcibiades 
and  Andocides  were  implicated,  was  a  great  scandal. 

Aphrodite  was  goddess  of  love,  marriage,  and  the 
family.  Her  worship,  in  which  were  blended  various 
oriental  elements,  was  not  of  especial  local  import  in 
Athens. 

The  cult  of  the  god  Asclepius  (Roman  Aesculapius ) 
deserves  brief  characterization  because  of  its  interest¬ 
ing  features.  At  Athens,  on  the  southern  side  of  the 
Acropolis  and  just  west  of  the  theater,  are  the  remains 
of  the  sanctuary  of  Asclepius  —  a  long  colonnade,  and 
the  foundations  of  a  small  temple.  These  remains  seem 
to  be  of  the  fourth  century  b.c.,  but  the  sanctuary 
surely  dates  from  the  fifth.  Here,  patients  in  quest  of 
health,  and  worshippers  came,  slept,  and  sacrificed. 
The  chief  scene  of  the  worship  of  Asclepius,  however, 


266 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


was  at  Epidaurus  in  the  Peloponnesus,  and  from  here, 
no  doubt,  the  cult  of  the  god  of  healing  had  come  to 
Athens.  Excavations  at  Epidaurus  have  revealed  a 
flourishing  religious  center,  where  there  were  built  a 
beautiful  theater  (the  best  preserved  today  of  all 
Greek  theaters),  the  temple  of  Asclepius,  the  Rotunda 
( Tholos ),  the  temple  of  Artemis,  a  great  colonnade, 
and  a  stadium.  These  buildings  are  of  the  fourth  cen¬ 
tury  b.c.,  but  the  worship  of  the  god  on  this  site  must 
have  been  of  great  antiquity.  The  colonnade  served  as  a 
dormitory  in  which  the  patients  slept  and  in  a  dream 
awaited  as  a  revelation  from  the  god  the  manner  of 
their  alleviation,  or  an  actual  cure  during  the  night. 
In  case  of  a  cure  the  grateful  suppliant  might  dedicate 
to  the  god  a  votive  offering  representing  the  part  of  the 
body  healed,  as,  for  example,  ears  or  eyes  or  hands. 
Many  inscriptions  have  been  found  which  attest  the 
cures  effected  by  the  god.  A  few  examples  of  these 
follow  (taken  from  Frazer,  Pausanias,  3,  p.  249): 

“  A  man,  whose  fingers  were  all  paralyzed  but  one,  came  as 
a  suppliant  to  the  god.  But  when  he  saw  the  tablets  in  the 
sanctuary  with  the  miraculous  cures  recorded  on  them,  he  was 
incredulous  and  scoffed  at  the  cures.  However,  he  fell  asleep  in 
the  dormitory  and  dreamed  a  dream.  He  thought  he  was  playing 
dice  in  the  temple  and  that  as  he  was  about  to  make  a  throw,  the 
god  seized  his  hand  and  straightened  out  his  fingers.  In  the 
morning  he  went  forth  whole. 

Alcetas  of  Halice,  a  blind  man,  had  a  dream.  He  thought  that 
the  god  came  and  opened  his  eyes  with  his  fingers,  and  so  he  saw 
the  trees  in  the  sanctuary  for  the  first  time;  in  the  morning  he 
went  forth  whole. 

Thyson,  a  blind  boy  of  Hermion,  had  his  eyes  licked  by  one  of 
the  dogs  about  the  temple  and  went  away  whole. 

A  man  who  suffered  much  from  an  ulcer  on  the  toe  was  brought 
forth  by  the  attendants  and  placed  on  a  seat.  While  he  slept,  a 
serpent  came  forth  from  the  dormitory  and  healed  the  ulcer  with 
his  tongue.  It  then  glided  back  into  the  dormitory.  When  the 
man  awoke  he  was  cured  and  declared  that  he  had  seen  a  vision; 
he  thought  a  young  man  of  goodly  aspect  had  smeared  a  salve 
upon  his  toe. 

Arata,  a  Lacedaemonian  woman,  came  to  Epidaurus  on  behalf 
of  her  daughter  who  was  afflicted  with  dropsy  and  had  been  left 
behind  in  Lacedaemon.  She  slept  in  the  sanctuary  and  dreamed 
a  dream.  She  thought  that  the  god  cut  off  her  daughter’s 
head  and  hung  up  the  headless  trunk,  neck  down.  When  all 


RELIGION 


267 


the  moisture  had  run  out,  he  took  down  the  body,  and  put  on 
the  head  again.  After  she  had  dreamed  this  dream,  the  mother 
returned  to  Lacedaemon,  where  she  found  that  her  daughter 
was  cured,  and  had  seen  the  very  same  dream.” 

It  is  evident  that  sacred  dogs  and  serpents  were  kept 
in  the  sanctuary  of  Asclepius. 

What  shall  we  say  regarding  the  authenticity  of  these 
miraculous  cures  ascribed  to  the  divine  intervention 
of  the  god?  No  doubt  when  the  patient  was  suffering 
from  a  malady  more  or  less  imaginary,  amelioration 
followed  prayer,  faith,  auto-suggestion,  and  the  advice 
and  consolation  of  the  priests.  Furthermore,  these 
priests  were  doubtless  experienced  healers  and  their 
medical  and  surgical  knowledge  often  must  have  been 
employed  in  the  sufferers’  behalf. 

Besides  these  positive  influences  —  Orphism,  the 
Mysteries,  and  the  traditional  worship  of  the  gods 
of  their  fathers  —  Athenian  religious  belief  of  the  fifth 
and  fourth  centuries  b.c.  was  subjected  to  powerful 
forces  of  philosophical  and  scientific  inquiry  which 
tended  to  produce  uncertainty  and  scepticism.  The  old 
mythology  and  the  old  beliefs  were  in  many  particulars 
untenable,  if  faith  were  placed  in  the  speculations  of 
the  early  philosophers  and  physicists  and,  later  on,  of 
the  Sophists. 

How  could  one  believe  implicitly  in  the  Homeric  and 
Hesiodic  conceptions  of  the  creation  of  the  world,  gods, 
and  men,  if  credence  were  given  to  those  Ionian  philos¬ 
ophers  who  explained  the  nature  of  things  as  originat¬ 
ing  in  a  first  principle,  apart  from  the  gods?  Thales 
defined  this  first  principle  as  water;  Anaximenes  as 
air;  Heraclitus  as  fire;  Anaxagoras  as  Nous  (Mind  or 
Reason).  These  early  thinkers,  to  be  sure,  did  not 
actually  disbelieve  in  the  existence  of  the  gods,  yet 
their  speculations  in  effect  were  a  negation  of  divine 
omnipotence  and  importance.  Certainly  their  teach¬ 
ings  were  popularly  interpreted  as  being  at  variance 
with  the  accepted  religion,  so  that  Anaxagoras  was 


268 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


compelled  to  leave  Athens,  partly,  at  least,  because  of 
his  heterodox  views.  The  resulting  situation  in  the 
realm  of  religious  thought  may  be  compared  with  the 
confusion  in  the  modern  world  during  the  previous  gen¬ 
eration,  and  even  now  far  from  ended,  caused  by  a*  sup¬ 
posed  conflict  and  incompatibility  of  science  and  the 
Christian  religion. 

Scepticism  early  shows  itself  in  the  striking  protests 
and  criticisms  of  Xenophanes,  the  Eleatic  philosopher- 
poet,  in  the  plays  of  Euripides,  and  in  the  queries  and 
the  teachings  of  the  popular  sophists,  whose  influence 
upon  the  younger  generation  was  great. 

The  ideas  and  dialectic  of  Socrates  and  Plato  should 
be  studied  in  connection  with  philosophy  and  logic 
yet  religious  elements  are  potent  in  the  teachings  of 
these  thinkers.  Socrates  was  a  student  and  expounder 
of  ethics  primarily,  but  his  ethics  were  fundamentally 
religious,  and  his  work  in  Athens  he  regarded  as  a 
divine  mission,  divinely  guided.  His  teaching  was 
largely  spiritual,  as  can  be  seen  from  the  dialogues  of 
Plato  where  Socrates  regularly  is  the  chief  speaker. 

Summing  up  Plato’s  religious  creed  briefly,  we  may 
say  that  he  believed  in  the  practice  of  justice  and  of 
holiness  which  is  righteousness ;  he  held  that  real  knowl¬ 
edge  must  be  ascertained  and,  in  consequence,  virtue 
will  be  the  inevitable  result.  He  accepted  to  some  ex¬ 
tent  the  Orphic  doctrines,  in  that  he  believed  that  the 
soul  is  divine  and  the  body  is  as  a  prison-house;  death 
therefore  was  to  him  a  boon,  an  escape,  which  frees 
one  from  evil;  the  soul  is  immortal  and  after  trans¬ 
migration  returns  to  God;  God  himself  would  seem  to 
be  the  highest  of  the  Ideas  —  the  Idea  of  Good.  In 
Plato  we  find  a  welcome  given  to  all  that  is  best  and 
finest  in  previous  Greek  religious  tradition  and  likewise 
a  rejection  of  crude  myth  or  palpable  error. 

From  this  brief  survey  of  the  origin  and  the  nature 
of  the  diverse  elements  contributing  to  Greek  religious 
thought  it  is  evident  that  a  dogmatic  generalization 


RELIGION 


269 


relative  to  Athenian  religion  is  hazardous.  We  read, 
for  example,  that  Greek  religion  was  largely  a  poly¬ 
theistic  worship  of  anthropomorphic  gods  through  the 
medium  of  sacrifice;  further,  that  these  gods  were 
powerful,  but  humanly  fallible  and  even  cruel,  and 
sacrifice  to  them  by  worshippers  was  a  matter  of  “  give 
and  take,”  or,  as  Plato  states  it,  “  an  art  of  trafficking.” 
And  it  is  true  that  a  general  impression  of  this  tenor 
is  left  upon  the  mind  of  the  reader  of  Homer,  Hesiod, 
and  the  lyric  poets.  We  are  informed,  moreover,  that 
a  rather  primitive  and  superstitious  belief  in  an  imagi¬ 
native  but  conflicting  mythology  held  sway  over  the 
Athenian  mind.  And  substantiation  of  this  assertion 
may  be  gained  from  countless  references  and  passages 
throughout  Greek  literature.  The  popular  view  of 
Greek  religion  is,  that  it  was  lacking  in  a  conception 
of  sin,  that  it  offered  little  or  no  hope  of  immortality, 
that  it  denied  to  humanity  the  expectation  of  a  happy 
future  existence,  and  that  it  considered  improbable 
any  approximation  or  kinship  of  the  human  with  the 
divine. 

To  the  correctness  of  this  characterization  candor 
compels  answer  that  many  proofs  are  forthcoming. 
And  yet  we  find  the  early  philosophers  calmly  ignor¬ 
ing  the  old  cosmogonies  and  theogonies.  Xenoph¬ 
anes,  Euripides,  and  Plato  reject  anthropomorphism 
and  the  attribution  of  base  deeds  to  the  gods.  We  see 
Xenophanes  and  Plato,  though  not  entirely  shaking 
themselves  free  from  polytheism,  yet  affirming  and 
expounding  an  almost  montheistic  conception  of  the 
deity;  Orphism  taught  the  divinity  of  the  soul,  the  be¬ 
lief  in  immortality,  the  necessity  of  good  conduct  in 
this  world,  and  the  possibility  of  salvation  in  the  next. 
The  Eleusinian  Mysteries,  as  Orphism,  exhorted  de¬ 
votees  to  purification  and  righteous  behavior,  whereby 
a  happy  and  blessed  life  after  death  would  be  obtained. 
Hesiod  asserted  the  importance  of  hard  work  and  jus¬ 
tice  towards  all;  Theognis  emphasized  thrift  and  in¬ 
dustry;  Socrates  preached,  year  in  and  year  out,  ethi- 


270 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


cal  conduct  which  is,  at  its  best,  Christian;  Aeschylus 
and  Sophocles  in  their  great  plays  inculcated  morality, 
and  proclaimed  with  assurance  that  there  is  a  god  in 
his  heaven  and  all  will  be  well  in  the  end. 

It  may  be  objected  that  the  influences  and  ideals 
above  outlined  were  not  far-reaching  in  their  effects 
and  were  of  little  importance  in  shaping  the  views  and 
affecting  the  conduct  of  the  average  Athenian.  No 
doubt  this  was  true  of  the  more  ignorant  and  unthink¬ 
ing.  Yet  if  Orphism  and  Plato  won  comparatively  few 
followers,  the  mass  of  the  citizens,  by  nature  keen¬ 
witted,  curious,  and  susceptible,  were  surely  responsive 
to  the  great  moral  teachings  of  Attic  tragedy  and  the 
sacred  and  emotional  appeal  of  the  Mysteries  of 
Eleusis. 

In  seeking  to  understand  the  nature  of  Greek  reli¬ 
gion,  however,  we  must  try  to  divest  ourselves  of  mod¬ 
ern  religious  conceptions  which  are  largely  Hebraic. 
Greek  religion  is  ethical  rather  than  theological,  and 
was  concerned  far  more  with  actual  life  in  this  world 
than  with  preparation  for  the  next.  In  consequence, 
it  was  not  calculated  to  give  solace  in  adversity  and  in 
old  age,  nor  assurance  regarding  the  hopes  and  aspira¬ 
tions  of  the  future.  But  sophrosyne  (temperance  and 
moderation)  underlay  Athenian  thought  and  action 
and,  above  all,  good  taste  in  all  things,  and  a  sense  of 
the  fitting  and  of  the  beautiful.  And  these  ideals,  if 
they  are  followed  in  the  conduct  of  daily  life,  form  no 
mean  religion. 

It  is  highly  important  that  the  student  of  religion 
should  realize  the  Greek  element  in  Christian  religion. 
The  ethical  teachings  of  Socrates  and  Plato  are  not  dis¬ 
similar  to  those  of  Christ.  The  later  Greek  philosophy, 
derived  in  large  measure  from  Plato,  profoundly  in¬ 
fluenced  Christian  thought  and  dogma.  While  Chris¬ 
tianity  had  its  origin  in  Palestine,  yet  it  found  expres¬ 
sion  and  became  universal  only  through  the  aid  of 
Greek  rhetoric  and  philosophy. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

SCIENCE 

“In  science  the  Greeks  had  to  build  from  the  foundations. 
Other  peoples  had  extensive  knowledge  and  highly  developed 
arts.  Only  among  the  Greeks  existed  the  true  scientific  method 
with  its  characteristics  of  free  inquiry,  rational  interpretation, 
verification  or  rectification  by  systematic  and  repeated  observa¬ 
tion,  and  controlled  deduction  from  accepted  principles.”  —  Sedg¬ 
wick  and  Tyler. 

OUR  modern  age,  in  which  physical  science  is  so 
prominent,  is  prone  to  ignore  Greek  scientific 
achievements,  which  are,  however,  far  more 
considerable  than  is  generally  thought.  The  scope  of 
this  volume,  largely  devoted  to  Athens  in  the  classical 
period,  precludes  lengthy  consideration  of  theories  and 
discoveries  in  Greek  science:  the  latter,  in  fact,  were 
mostly  products  of  the  less  creative,  but  scholarly, 
Alexandrian  Age. 

It  is  not  surprising  that  the  world  today,  which  has 
brought  to  actual  realization  through  miraculous  in¬ 
ventions  of  the  last  few  decades  the  mere  dreams  and 
myths  of  antiquity,  should  largely  ignore  the  gropings 
in  the  physical  sciences  of  the  scientists  of  over  two 
thousand  years  ago.  Nor,  in  a  sense,  is  our  ignorance 
and  indifference  in  the  matter  of  Greek  scientific  attain¬ 
ments  so  serious  as  would  be  our  neglect  of  Greek  ideas, 
ideals,  and  art;  all  agree  that  in  the  latter  fields  modern 
materialism  and  commercialism  have  much  indeed  to 
learn  from  ancient  Hellas,  whereas  in  science  we  are 
supreme.  However,  a  few  of  the  most  striking  facts 
relative  to  Greek  scientific  knowledge,  theories,  and 
discoveries  may  find  a  place  here  and  should  be  of  in¬ 
terest.  For  extremely  technical  details  the  specialist 
is  referred  to  the  ample  bibliography  on  this  chapter 
to  be  found  in  the  appendix. 

271 


272 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


It  will  be  noted  that  the  sciences  which  most  of  all 
appealed  to  the  Greek  mind  were  mathematics  and 
mathematical  astronomy.  Medicine  and  anatomy  came 
next,  perhaps,  then  geography,  botany,  and  the  natural 
sciences  in  general.  Chemistry  was  not  considered  or 
studied  as  a  science  apart,  but  rather  as  a  handmaid 
of  the  practical  arts,  a  necessary  stock-in-trade  of  those 
who  devoted  themselves  to  manufactures. 

The  truth  is  that  the  Greeks  were  interested  primarily 
in  the  study  of  man  and  in  the  investigation  of  Nature 
as  man's  environment.  The  intense  study  of  Nature 
per  se  was  not  pursued  unremittingly  by  them. 

Early  Greek  science  was  so  intimately  associated 
with  philosophy  that  it  cannot  be  separated  from  it. 
In  the  chapter  on  Philosophy  we  saw  the  interest  of  the 
early  pre-Socratic  thinkers  in  the  physical  sciences  and 
in  mathematics.  In  the  sixth  century  b.c.,  Thales, 
whose  name  comes  first  in  the  history  of  Greek  philoso¬ 
phy,  was  a  mathematician  and  astronomer;  several 
theorems  of  elementary  geometry  are  ascribed  to  him 
and  he  is  said  to  have  prophesied  an  eclipse  of  the  sun 
(585  (?)  b.c.) .  Anaximander  thought  that  Man  came 
into  being  from  the  fish;  it  is  said,  too,  that  for  geo¬ 
graphical  science  Anaximander  drew  the  first  map  of 
the  world,  and  that  he  introduced  the  sun-dial. 

The  first  important  Greek  mathematician  was  Pythag¬ 
oras  (sixth  century  b.c.)  who  taught  his  Theory  of 
Numbers  and  made  numerous  discoveries  in  arithmetic, 
geometry,  and  acoustics.  In  astronomy,  the  Pythag¬ 
oreans  believed  that  the  globular  earth  moved  in 
empty  space  while  the  sun,  moon  and  stars  remained 
immovable.  They  did  not,  however,  urge  the  helio¬ 
centric  theory;  credit  for  this  is  to  be  given  to 
Aristarchus. 

For  the  striking  theories  of  the  early  physicist- 
philosophers  the  reader  should  turn  to  the  chapter  on 
Philosophy,  e.g.,  for  Heraclitus  and  his  doctrine  of 
“  Fire  ”  and  “  Flux,”  for  the  views  and  notable  achieve- 


SCIENCE 


273 


ments  of  the  versatile  Empedocles,  for  Anaxagoras  and 
his  “  Seeds  ”  and,  finally,  for  the  extremely  interesting 
and  tremendously  important  doctrines  of  the  Atomists, 
Leucippus  and  Democritus. 

Of  Greek  Mathematics  geometry  was  by  far  the 
most  important  branch.  Plato  was  intensely  interested 
in  geometry,  which  had  been  studied  by  Thales  and 
Pythagoras,  and  we  are  told  that  over  the  door  of  the 
Academy  this  motto  was  to  be  read:  “  Let  no  one  ig¬ 
norant  of  geometry  enter  within.’ 7  The  Platonic  dia¬ 
logues  show  that  the  great  philosopher  had  a  very  con¬ 
siderable  knowledge  of  geometry.  Eudemus  (about 
33 o  b.c.),  the  pupil  of  Aristotle,  wrote  a  history  of 
geometry  which  is  not  now  extant. 

Alexandria  in  Egypt,  founded  by  Alexander  the 
Great  in  332  b.c,,  grew  with  great  rapidity.  Under  the 
patronage  of  the  Ptolemies,  the  Museum  and  the  large 
Library  attracted  numerous  scholars  and  thousands  of 
students  —  the  first  real  University  in  the  modern  sense 
of  the  term.  All  branches  of  learning  were  there  studied 
and  furthered  by  distinguished  scholars.  In  literature 
this  scholarship  was  devoted,  as  we  have  seen,  to  the 
annotation  and  editing  of  the  classical  authors  and  few 
original  compositions  of  literary  excellence  were  pro¬ 
duced.  In  science,  however,  Alexandria  became  a  great 
center.  After  300  b.c.  the  history  of  Greek  science  is, 
for  the  most  part,  the  history  of  Alexandrian  science. 
Pergamum  and  other  cities  were  rivals,  but  were  feeble 
by  comparison. 

The  reputed  founder  of  the  Alexandrian  school  of 
mathematics  was  Euclid,  the  author  of  the  epoch-mak¬ 
ing  treatise  on  geometry.  The  Elements  of  Euclid 
(about  300  b.c.) ,  in  thirteen  books,  supplanted  all 
former  works  on  the  subject  and  have  remained  the 
very  basis  of  elementary  geometry  to  the  present  day. 
In  fact,  Euclid  and  geometry  have  been  synonymous 
terms  for  centuries. 

Archimedes  of  Syracuse  (about  287-212  b.c.),  who 


274 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


studied  at  Alexandria,  was  a  more  versatile  mathema¬ 
tician  than  Euclid.  Not  only  did  he  write  a  great  work 
—  now  lost  —  on  geometry,  but  there  are  extant 
treatises  by  him  on  the  Sphere  and  the  Cylinder,  the 
Measurement  of  the  Circle,  On  Conoids  and  Spheroids, 
and  other  works.  Archimedes  was  specially  interested 
in  Statics  and  Hydrostatics.  It  was  the  successful  solu¬ 
tion  of  a  problem  in  the  latter  subject  which  caused 
him,  as  the  story  relates,  to  leap  from  the  bath  and  to 
run  home  naked,  crying,  “  Eureka!  Eureka!  (I  have 
found  it).”  To  Archimedes,  too,  as  pioneer  in  me¬ 
chanics  and  the  theory  and  practice  of  the  lever,  is 
ascribed  the  famous  remark,  “  Give  me  a  place  to  stand 
and  I  will  move  the  earth.” 

Other  prominent  mathematicians  were  Apollonius  of 
Perga  “  the  Great  Geometer  ”  (born  about  262  b.c.) 
and,  much  later,  Pappus  and  Diophantus,  of  about  300 
a.d.  Diophantus  of  Alexandria  has  the  distinction  of 
being  the  author  of  the  first  extant  treatise  on  algebra, 
although  the  original  Greek  work,  in  thirteen  books,  is 
now  represented  in  a  Latin  translation  of  the  first  six 
books  only. 

As  for  the  value  and  the  accuracy  of  the  mathemati¬ 
cal  investigation  of  the  Greeks  a  competent  critic  1  in 
this  field,  may  be  quoted:  “  Acquaintance  with  the 
original  work  of  the  Greek  mathematicians  is  necessary 
for  any  mathematician  worthy  of  the  name.  Mathe¬ 
matics  is  a  Greek  science.  So  far  as  pure  geometry  is 
concerned,  the  mathematician’s  technical  equipment  is 
almost  wholly  Greek.  The  Greeks  laid  down  the  prin¬ 
ciples,  fixed  the  terminology,  and  invented  the  methods 
ab  initio:  moreover,  they  did  this  with  such  certainty 
that  in  the  centuries  which  have  since  elapsed  there  has 
been  no  need  to  reconstruct,  still  less  to  reject  as  un¬ 
sound,  any  essential  part  of  their  doctrine.” 

Many  ingenious  inventions  and  mechanical  appli¬ 
ances,  some  of  which  we  may  think  of  modern  origin, 
came  from  the  researches  of  these  men  of  science. 

1  Mr.  T.  L.  Heath,  in  The  Legacy  of  Greece,  p.  98. 


SCIENCE 


275 


Archytas  is  said  to  have  invented  the  screw  and  the 
pulley.  Archimedes  originated  the  water-screw,  dis¬ 
covered  the  principle  of  the  lever,  and  perfected  new 
military  engines. 

Perhaps  the  most  versatile  inventive  genius  of  the 
ancient  Greek  world  was  Hero  (or  Heron) ,  of  uncertain 
date,  a  mathematician,  whose  inventions  are  numerous. 
He  wrote  a  work,  Pneumatica ,  wherein  ingenious  de¬ 
vices  are  described.  Among  these  contrivances  were: 
the  first  penny-in- the-slot  machine  (a  Holy- Water  au¬ 
tomaton,  a  steam-sphere  which  rotated  by  the  retro¬ 
action  of  escaping  steam,  and  other  steam  appliances; 
Hero’s  Ball,  from  which  water  was  forced  out  by  com¬ 
pressed  air,  the  principle  of  the  fire-engine;  a  water- 
organ;  and  the  hodometer ,  or  road-measurer  (“  the 
wheel  of  a  vehicle  sets  in  motion  a  series  of  cog-wheels, 
like  clock-work,  which  record  the  rotations  of  the  care¬ 
fully  measured  wheel,  and  so  gives  the  distance  passed 
over  ”). 

Greek  Astronomy  had  its  beginnings  in  the  studies 
of  Thales  and  Pythagoras.  It  was  further  developed  by 
Eudoxus  of  Cnidus  (408-355  b.c.),  who  wrote  a  work 
called  the  Phaenomena,  subsequently  reproduced  by 
Aratus  ( ca .  270  b.c-).  As  in  the  case  of  mathematics, 
Alexandria  became  the  center  of  astronomical  study 
and  really  great  discoveries  were  made. 

Copernicus  was  anticipated  in  the  heliocentric  theory 
by  Aristarchus  of  Samos  ( ca .  270  b.c.).  Archimedes 
states  that  Aristarchus  conjectured  that  “  neither  the 
fixed  stars  nor  the  sun  are  subject  to  any  motion;  but 
the  earth  annually  revolves  round  the  sun  in  the  cir¬ 
cumference  of  a  circle,  in  the  center  of  which  the  sun 
remains  fixed.”  This  striking  theory,  however,  did  not 
win  acceptance  at  the  time. 

Remarkable,  too,  were  the  researches  of  Eratos¬ 
thenes  ( ca .  275-195  b.c.) ,  librarian  at  Alexandria.  He 
asserted  that  the  earth  is  spherical,  and,  as  Strabo  tells 
us,  that  India  might  be  reached  by  sailing  westward 


276 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


from  Iberia,  if  the  immensity  of  the  Atlantic  Ocean  did 
not  prevent!  That  the  earth  is  round  is  proved,  he 
said,  by  the  convexity  of  the  sea.  Distant  lights  at  sea 
level  can  not  be  seen  by  sailors,  but  if  these  lights  are 
elevated  they  are  at  once  visible.  To  sailors  approach¬ 
ing  land  the  shore  continually  rises  and  objects  that 
formerly  seemed  low  grow  in  size  (Strabo,  i.  i.  20,  and 
1.  4.  6).  Eratosthenes  also  computed  mathematically 
the  circumference  of  the  earth  and  found  it  to  be 
250,000  stadia  —  there  are  between  eight  and  nine 
stades  in  an  English  mile  —  which  is  amazingly  close 
to  the  actual  measurement  of  25,000  English  miles. 

The  last  two  great  Greek  astronomers  were  Hip¬ 
parchus  and  Ptolemy.  The  former  founded  the  science 
of  trigonometry,  catalogued  the  stars,  and  correctly 
established  numerous  important  astronomical  facts. 
Ptolemy  is  the  author  of  the  great  work  which  forms 
the  basis  of  the  Almagest.  His  astronomical  system 
was  regarded  as  standard  until  the  time  of  Copernicus. 

In  the  natural  sciences  Aristotle,  that  master  of 
learning,  wrote  important  works  on  animals  ( Historia 
Animalium)  and  the  Parts  of  Animals  and  these  works, 
which  show  keen  observation,  survive  from  his  inves¬ 
tigations  in  the  province  of  nature.  Theophrastus,  his 
pupil  and  successor  in  the  Lyceum,  composed  a  Treatise 
on  Plants.  This  work,  the  most  important  study  in 
botanical  science  produced  by  the  Greeks,  has  recently 
been  translated  and  is  now  available  to  all  botanists. 

The  most  important  branch  of  science  among  the 
Greeks,  after  mathematics,  was  Medicine.  Let  us 
briefly  trace  the  development  and  tendencies  in  this 
province  of  study. 

The  cult  of  Asclepius  (Roman  Aesculapius) ,  the  god 
of  healing,  and  the  cures  effected  by  priests  in  the 
temples  of  that  deity,  especially  at  Epidaurus,  are  de¬ 
scribed  in  the  chapter  on  Religion. 

Greek  medical  science  really  begins  in  the  sixth  cen¬ 
tury  b.c.  with  the  School  of  the  island  of  Cos,  whose 


SCIENCE 


277 


foremost  representative  is  the  great  Hippocrates,  who 
was  born  in  460  b.c.  Alexandrian  scholars  collected  the 
writings  of  this  school  —  the  Hippocratic  Corpus  or 
Collection  —  and  these  give  us  much  information  re¬ 
garding  its  teachings  and  methods  during  the  period 
from  the  sixth  to  the  fourth  centuries  b.c.  Although 
the  Pythagoreans,  as  early  as  500  b.c.,  had  done  some  1 
dissecting  of  animals  the  ignorance  of  anatomy,  physi¬ 
ology,  and  pathology  was  profound  and  general  before 
the  Alexandrian  Age,  when  dissection  of  the  human 
body  was  first  countenanced.  The  medical  knowledge 
of  Hippocrates,  the  Father  of  Medicine,  was  based  on 
the  recognition  that  disease  is  a  natural  phenomenon, 
on  careful  clinical  observation,  and  the  discovery  that 
Nature  herself  is  a  beneficent  healer.  Medical  treat¬ 
ment  consisted  of  such  sensible  procedure  as  baths, 
massages,  careful  diet,  and  suffusions.  Unfortunately 
the  practice  of  bleeding  —  the  curse  of  medicine  for 
centuries  —  was  also  in  vogue,  although  it  was  appar¬ 
ently  employed  in  moderation.  The  Hippocratic  School 
achieved  proficiency  in  surgery,  especially  in  the  treat¬ 
ment  of  dislocations,  fractures,  and  bandaging.  Drugs 
were  employed  and  some  265  kinds  are  mentioned  in 
the  Hippocratic  Collection.  This  school  held  the  theory 
that  health  and  disease  depend  upon  the  four  “  hu¬ 
mors  ”  of  the  body  —  blood,  phlegm,  yellow  bile,  and 
black  bile  —  and  that  the  physical  condition  depends 
on  the  proportion  in  which  these  are  mixed.  This 
theory  was  popularized  by  Galen.  The  fame  of  Hip¬ 
pocrates  was  very  great;  he  traveled  much  and  his 
pupils  were  numerous.  Of  unimpeachable  probity  him¬ 
self,  his  ideal  of  the  good  physician  is  the  practitioner 
of  high  ethical  standards  and  professional  behavior. 
This  ideal  is  incorporated  in  the  well-known  Hippo¬ 
cratic  Oath,  an  oath  which  is  still  sworn  to  by  gradu¬ 
ates  of  our  medical  schools.  The  concluding  words  of 
this  remarkable  oath  are:  “With  purity  and  holiness 
I  will  pass  my  life  and  practice  my  Art.  Into  whatever 
houses  I  enter,  I  will  go  there  for  the  benefit  of  the  sick 


278 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


and  will  abstain  from  every  injurious  act  and  corrup¬ 
tion.  Whatever  in  my  professional  practice  —  or  even 
not  in  connection  with  it  —  I  see  or  hear  in  the  lives 
of  men  which  ought  not  to  be  spoken  of  abroad,  I  will 
not  divulge.  While  I  keep  this  Oath  unviolated,  may 
it  be  granted  me  to  enjoy  life  and  the  practice  of  the 
Art,  always  respected  among  men,  but  should  I  break 
or  violate  the  Oath,  may  the  reverse  be  my  lot.” 

A  new  era  of  medicine  dates  from  the  Alexandrian 
Age  when,  in  the  city  founded  by  Alexander  the  Great, 
great  strides  were  taken.  Discoveries  in  anatomy  and 
physiology  were  stimulated  by  the  fact  that  dissection 
of  the  human  body  was  at  last  allowed.  Cadavers  were 
disemboweled  for  mummification  and  vivisection  of 
criminals  was  legally  permitted.  The  two  greatest 
medical  scientists  of  Alexandria  were  Herophilus  and 
Erasistratus  of  the  third  century  b.c.  Herophilus 
named  the  duodenum  and  other  structures  which  still 
bear  his  name.  He  discovered  the  importance  of  the 
brain,  the  nature  of  the  nerves  and,  most  important  of 
all,  the  function  of  the  arteries  in  conveying  blood  from 
the  heart  to  all  parts  of  the  body.  It  had  been  pre¬ 
viously  supposed  that  the  arteries  contained  air  — 
hence  their  name.  Herophilus  also  described  the  pulse 
and  showed  how  its  behavior  affords  indication  of 
health  and  disease.  Thus  was  Harvey  (1578-1657) 
virtually  anticipated  in  the  discovery  of  the  circulation 
of  the  blood. 

Erasistratus  made  other  discoveries  in  the  anatomy 
of  the  brain,  the  valves  of  the  heart,  the  epiglottis,  and 
the  nervous  system. 

Pliny  tells  us  that  “  the  ancients  were  accustomed  to 
giving  mandragora  as  an  anaesthetic  for  injuries  in¬ 
flicted  by  serpents,  and  before  incisions  or  punctures 
are  made  in  the  body  in  order  to  insure  insensibility  to 
pain.” 

In  the  treatise  of  Celsus  (first  century  a.d.)  on  medi¬ 
cine,  a  Latin  work,  in  eight  books,  probably  translated 
from  Greek,  we  have  a  complete  account  of  medicine 


SCIENCE 


279 


as  it  then  existed.  The  sections  of  this  work  which 
treat  of  surgery  and  internal  medicine  are  very  good. 
Dioscorides  wrote  on  drugs,  Rufus  of  Ephesus  on  hu¬ 
man  anatomy,  Soranus  of  Ephesus  on  gynaecology,  and 
Aretaeus  on  clinical  medicine. 

Greatest  in  the  bulk  of  his  extant  medical  writings 
and  in  influence  on  the  history  of  medicine,  is  Galen, 
who  was  born  at  Pergamum  about  130  a.d.  His  writ¬ 
ings,  now  published  in  twenty-two  volumes,  treat  of  all 
branches  of  medicine  and  surgery.  Galen  spent  some 
years  at  Alexandria  and  also  at  Rome.  The  writings 
of  Galen  and  of  Hippocrates  are  at  the  very  basis  of 
medicine  today.  From  the  brief  summary  above  pre¬ 
sented  it  will  be  seen  that  the  Greeks  created  modern 
medicine. 

In  concluding  this  chapter,  another  quotation  from  a 
scholar  who  has  done  much  to  interpret  Greek  science 
to  this  generation,  Mr.  T.  L.  Heath,  is  appropriate: 
“  When  we  think  of  the  debt  which  mankind  owes  to 
the  Greeks,  we  are  apt  to  think  too  exclusively  of  the 
masterpieces  in  literature  and  art  which  they  have  left 
us.  But  the  Greek  genius  was  many-sided;  the  Greek, 
with  his  insatiable  love  of  knowledge,  his  determination 
to  see  things  as  they  are  and  to  see  them  whole,  his 
burning  desire  to  be  able  to  give  a  rational  explanation 
of  everything  in  heaven  and  earth,  was  just  as  irre¬ 
sistibly  driven  to  natural  science,  mathematics,  and 
exact  reasoning  in  general,  or  logic.” 


CHAPTER  XIX 

THE  NEW  STUDY  OF  ANCIENT  GREECE 

“  Continually  laid  aside  —  it  is  too  tremendous  and  fatiguing 
for  the  world  to  live  up  to;  continually  rediscovered  —  for  the 
world  cannot  live  without  it:  that  is  the  history  of  the  Greek 
genius.”  —  R.  W.  Livingstone. 

THE  title  of  this  chapter  may  seem  paradoxical 
to  the  reader  who  is  unfamiliar  with  ancient 
Greek  civilization.  How  can  there  be  a  profit¬ 
able  new  study  of  a  civilization  long  since  passed  away 
and  of  a  people  whose  life  and  achievements  have  been 
studied  for  centuries?  Have  not  generations  of  scholars 
definitively  established  the  ancient  texts  to  the  smallest 
detail?  Has  not  the  last  word  been  said  in  the  criticism 
and  interpretation  of  Greek  literature  and  Greek  his¬ 
tory?  Surely  all  the  facts  must  be  known.  In  the  very 
nature  of  the  case,  how  can  there  be  new  evidence  and 
new  information  of  importance? 

Let  us  try  to  answer  some  of  these  questions.  It  will 
not  be  difficult,  I  think,  to  show  the  real  state  of  the 
case.  The  truth  is  that  in  recent  years  investigations, 
discoveries  of  all  kinds,  and  archaeological  excavations 
have  thrown  a  flood  of  new  light  on  ancient  Greek  lands 
and  civilization.  Fifty  years  ago  even  the  exact  site 
of  the  Homeric  Troy  was  uncertain  and  the  descriptive 
details  of  the  advanced  civilization  portrayed  in  the 
Homeric  poems  were  regarded  by  many  as  fictitious. 
But  the  excavations  of  1871-1886,  conducted  by 
Schliemann  and  Dorpfeld,  revealed  Priam’s  actual  city 
on  the  hill  of  Hissarlik  in  northwestern  Asia  Minor. 
Here  by  the  waters  of  the  Scamander,  in  the  plain  of 
the  Troad,  was  waged  an  actual  war,  the  ten  years’ 
siege  —  only  a  few  miles  distant  from  Gallipoli,  the 

280 


NEW  STUDY  OF  ANCIENT  GREECE  281 


scene  of  a  modern  sanguinary  struggle  —  in  which 
armies  of  Greece  and  Asia  fought,  although  these  hosts 
contended  not  for  lovely  white-armed  Helen,  as  the 
poet  would  have  us  believe,  but  more  plausibly  for 
causes  designated  by  the  modern  historian  which  bear 
all  too  familiar  names  —  economic  rivalry,  commercial 
supremacy,  and  the  control  of  the  Bosporus. 

More  remarkable  were  the  results  of  investigations 
at  Mycenae  “  rich-in-gold/’  Agamemnon’s  famous  capi¬ 
tal.  Here  were  excavated  tombs  within  the  Gate  of 
Lions  on  the  Acropolis,  and  the  spade  revealed  a  re¬ 
markable  and  hitherto  unknown  age  of  which  we  have 
written  briefly  in  another  chapter.  In  the  graves  were 
elaborately  and  beautifully  wrought  treasures  of  gold 
and  silver  —  masks,  breast-plates,  inlaid  daggers,  cups, 
and  vases.  This  great  civilization,  called  Mycenaean 
from  the  place  of  its  original  discovery,  was  prevalent 
also  in  the  island  of  Crete  (see  Chapter  II).  This 
Cretan  civilization  is  called  Minoan  in  honor  of  King 
Minos,  who  is  no  longer  a  mythical  potentate,  as  his 
extensive  palace-labyrinth  has  been  excavated  at  Cnos- 
sos.  Not  many  years  ago  1000  b.c.  seemed  an  in¬ 
credibly  early  date  to  use  in  speaking  of  Grecian  lands, 
but  now  we  possess  abundant  works  of  art  of  an  era 
to  be  dated  from  about  2500-1500  B.c. 

At  Olympia,  in  Elis,  the  site  of  the  great  Greek 
Games,  the  Germans  excavated  the  whole  Altis,  or  sa¬ 
cred  precinct,  laying  bare  the  foundations  of  many 
buildings,  especially  the  temples  of  Zeus  and  Hera.  A 
museum  erected  at  Olympia  contains  the  works  of  art 
discovered  there,  of  which  the  most  noteworthy  are  the 
Hermes  of  Praxiteles,  and  the  sculptured  pediment 
group  from  the  temple  of  Zeus.  Remarkable,  too,  and 
of  great  importance  are  the  results  of  the  work  done  by 
the  French  at  Delphi  and  Delos,  by  the  Americans  at 
Argos,  Corinth,  Athens,  and  Sardes,  and  by  the  Greeks 
at  Eleusis  and  Epidaurus. 

The  spade  is  still  being  actively  wielded  in  all  parts 
of  the  Greek  world  and  every  discovery  serves  to  cor- 


282 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


rect  or  to  corroborate  previous  conceptions  or  to  give 
us  absolutely  new  and  illuminating  knowledge  of  the 
civilization  that  is  the  mother  of  our  own.  Our  appre¬ 
ciation  of  Greek  literature  owes  much  to  these  revela¬ 
tions,  while  our  understanding  of  Greek  life  and 
thought  has  been,  and  is  being,  revolutionized  by  the 
inspiring  results  of  archaeological  studies. 

It  is  not  alone  new  inscriptions,  vases,  coins,  sculp¬ 
tures,  and  all  the  monuments  found  in  excavations, 
however,  which  necessitate  the  constant  revision  of 
books  on  ancient  Greek  civilization.  In  recent  years 
fate,  which  has  deprived  us  of  so  much  of  the  ancient 
literature,  has  made  some  amends.  The  tombs  and 
rubbish-heaps  of  Egypt  are  constantly  yielding  papyri 
manuscripts  of  every  kind.  While  the  majority  of 
these  papyri  are  bookkeeping  records,  farm  accounts, 
or  documents  of  small  consequence,  certain  of  these  lost 
works,  unexpectedly  recovered  after  the  lapse  of  cen¬ 
turies  from  the  sands  of  Egypt,  are  of  first-rate  im¬ 
portance  and  interest.  A  few  of  these  are:  several 
speeches  of  the  Attic  orator  Hyperides,  who  was  con¬ 
sidered  by  some  ancient  literary  critics  to  be  a  worthy 
rival  of  Demosthenes;  a  Partheneion  (a  lyric  for  a 
chorus  of  maidens)  by  Aleman;  the  Constitution  of 
Athens  by  Aristotle,  a  work  of  great  value  to  the  seri¬ 
ous  student  of  Greek  history  and  constitutional  law; 
the  Mimes ,  or  Dramatic  Sketches,  of  Herondas;  the 
Odes  of  Bacchylides,  a  writer  of  great  fame  in  antiquity, 
whose  writings  previously  were  unknown  to  us  except 
through  scanty  fragments;  and  the  Persians ,  a  lyric 
poem  of  some  250  lines  by  Timotheus.  But  this  is  not 
all.  An  epoch-making  find  was  the  discovery  in  1905 
of  large  portions  of  four  comedies  of  the  celebrated 
Menander:  these  plays  are  Hero ,  Arbitrants ,  Girl  with 
the  Shorn  Locks ,  and  the  Samian  Girl.  A  large  part 
of  the  Trackers,  a  satyric  play  by  Sophocles,  was  found 
in  1912.  The  Cyclops  of  Euripides  previously  had 
been  the  only  example  of  this  form  of  dramatic  com¬ 
position.  Several  valuable  fragments  of  poems  of 


NEW  STUDY  OF  ANCIENT  GREECE  283 


Sappho  have  also  been  discovered,  besides  fragments 
of  Pindar,  Lysias,  Callimachus  and  others.  As  a  result 
of  these  discoveries,  the  major  portion  of  which  have 
been  made  since  1891,  it  has  been  necessary  to  rewrite 
our  histories  of  Greek  literature,  and  writers  famous 
in  antiquity,  but  known  to  us  heretofore  by  name  only, 
can  now  be  read.  And  the  end  is  not  come,  for  each 
year  brings  something  new. 

How  is  it  with  the  condition  of  the  texts  that  we  have 
long  possessed?  Is  it  true  that  they  have  been  letter 
perfect  for  centuries?  Far  from  it,  unfortunately. 
Improvement  of  these  faulty  extant  works  is  constantly 
being  effected  through  their  revision,  emendation,  and 
interpretation.  Critical  scrutiny  and  sifting  of  extant 
Greek  compositions  have  resulted  also  in  the  purging 
of  many  documents  of  interpolations  and  the  attribu¬ 
tion  of  compositions  to  their  rightful  authors.  Our 
knowledge  in  these  matters  is  far  greater  than  that  of 
our  fathers.  It  seems  incredible  to  us,  for  example, 
that,  through  the  centuries,  Homer  was  thought  to  be 
the  author  of  the  mock-heroic  epic  the  Batrachomyo- 
machia  (the  Battle  of  the  Frogs  and  Mice),  which  was 
written  perhaps  about  490  b.c.  In  fact,  we  know  more 
about  the  early  literature,  so  far  as  authorship  is  con¬ 
cerned,  than  the  Athenians  themselves.  Aristotle,  with 
all  his  acumen,  thought  that  Homer  was  the  author  of 
the  satirical  poem  Margites,  and  Thucydides  believed 
that  he  was  borrowing  from  Homer  when  he  quoted 
some  lines  from  the  Hymn  to  Delian  Apollo ,  which  was 
written  centuries  later  than  the  Homeric  poems.  Shel¬ 
ley  called  his  delightful  versions  of  the  Hymn  to 
Hermes  and  other  Hymns,  Translations  from  Homer. 
The  extremely  popular  Anacreontics  of  Cowley  and 
Moore  were  not  originally  written  by  the  famous  lyri¬ 
cist  Atiacreon  of  Teos,  in  the  sixth  century  b.c.,  but 
are  of  late  Alexandrian  authorship. 

Plagiarism  and  forgeries,  more  venial  offenses  in 
ancient  times  than  with  us,  have  been  a  source  of  con¬ 
fusion  and  error.  An  interesting  example  of  literary 


2  84 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


forgery  is  presented  by  the  documents  found  in  the 
manuscripts  in  Demosthenes’  famous  speech  On  the 
Crown.  In  the  course  of  the  speech  the  orator  fre¬ 
quently  calls  upon  the  Clerk  of  the  Court  to  read  im¬ 
portant  documents  and  letters  bearing  on  the  case.  In 
the  Alexandrian  Period,  as  these  documents  had  dis¬ 
appeared,  some  ingenious  individual  essayed  to  make 
good  this  deficiency  by  providing  forgeries.  His  indus¬ 
try  seems  to  have  failed  him,  however,  when  he  was 
half  through  the  long  discourse  so  that  the  interpola¬ 
tions  are  entirely  wanting  in  the  latter  part  of  the  ora¬ 
tion.  So  clever  are  the  substitutions  that  commenta¬ 
tors  were  long  imposed  upon.  Modern  scholarship  has 
easily  revealed  the  falsity  of  the  inserted  documents. 

The  history  of  Homeric  scholarship  is  a  striking 
chapter  in  the  study  of  Greek  literature.  The  authen¬ 
ticity  of  the  Homeric  poems  has  been  a  vexed  question 
since  the  Alexandrian  Period  and  has  given  rise  to  a 
regrettably  large  literature.  Following  the  lead  of  the 
Separatists  in  the  second  century  b.c.,  and  of  F.  A. 
Wolf  in  1795,  numerous  scholars  have  attacked  the 
great  poems  in  an  effort  to  prove  that  the  Iliad  and  the 
Odyssey  could  not  have  been  the  work  of  one  man,  and 
that,  in  fact,  the  original  Iliad  and  Odyssey  were  com¬ 
paratively  insignificant  nuclei  for  the  inconsistent 
verses  and  passages  which  were  gradually  added  by 
later  bards.  Until  the  last  few  years,  from  the  time  of 
Wolf,  it  has  been  pretty  generally  believed  that  the 
Homeric  poems  are  of  extremely  composite  origin  and 
the  heterogeneous  product  of  numerous  individuals,  and 
that  the  Odyssey  in  particular  is  much  later  than  the 
Iliad.  Appreciation  and  enjoyment  of  Homer  as  sub¬ 
lime  poetry  have  been  lost  sight  of  because  of  the  la¬ 
bors,  often  mischievous,  of  specialists  who  have  been 
far  more  interested  in  pointing  out  supposed  flaws  and 
inconsistencies  than  in  showing  and  teaching  the  beauty 
and  power  of  the  great  poems.  In  the  last  ten  or 
twenty  years  the  pendulum  has  been  swinging  back. 
Today  there  are  many  believers  in  the  essential  unity 


NEW  STUDY  OF  ANCIENT  GREECE  285 


of  the  poems.  The  arguments  of  the  destructive  critics 
have  been  shown  to  be  largely  groundless  and  the  sup¬ 
posedly  fatal  inconsistencies  of  little  or  no  consequence. 
At  any  rate,  whatever  may  be  the  exact  answer  to  every 
question  suggested  by  Homer,  as  a  result  of  this  saner 
study  students  may  now  directly  approach  Homer. 
They  may  cease  to  read  about  the  poet  and  may,  as 
in  ancient  Hellas,  actually  enjoy  him. 

The  reader  of  the  above  paragraphs  will  now  ap¬ 
preciate,  I  think,  the  reason  and  the  necessity  for 
new  interpretations  of  Greek  history  and  literature. 
But  even  if  discoveries  of  inscriptions,  monuments,  and 
manuscripts  were  not  being  made,  has  not  our  concep¬ 
tion  of  the  writing  of  history  largely  changed?  History 
no  longer  consists  of  an  apparently  endless  string  of 
dates,  battles,  and  names  of  generals.  Due  prominence 
is  now  given  to  the  description  of  society,  the  people, 
their  language  and  literature,  their  art  and  religion, 
their  aspirations  and  achievements.  So  it  is  that  the 
student  of  Greek  history,  as  never  before,  now  has  the 
privilege  of  reading  the  fascinating  story  of  the  life  and 
thought  and  genius  of  the  people  themselves  in  the  light 
of  fuller  information  and  richer  appreciation. 

New  translations,  too,  are  constantly  needed.  The 
translations  which  pleased  the  taste  of  previous  genera¬ 
tions  utterly  fail  to  satisfy  the  modern  reader.  Pope’s 
Iliad ,  in  his  own  time  so  popular,  to  us  is  poetic,  but 
highly  artificial  and  un-Homeric.  Keats  waxed  enthusi¬ 
astic  over  Chapman’s  laborious  Homer.  All  these  ver¬ 
sions,  and  others  much  more  recent,  excellent  perhaps 
in  themselves  in  certain  particulars,  are  in  general  mis- 
representative  of  the  originals.  Ever-changing  taste, 
feeling,  idiom,  and  more  accurate  scholarship  make  im¬ 
perative  new  translations  for  those  who  are  denied 
enjoyment  at  first-hand  of  the  originals. 

There  is,  then,  a  new  study  of  ancient  Greece.  No 
one,  to  be  sure,  except  the  unfortunately  ignorant,  the 
hopelessly  prejudiced,  or  the  unregenerate  Philistine, 
denies  the  beauty  of  the  Greek  language,  the  excellence 


286 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


of  the  Greek  literature,  the  charm  and  originality  of 
Greek  art,  the  eternal  achievements  of  the  Greek  genius, 
and  the  value  of  a  realization  of  the  Greek  contribution 
to  the  modem  world.  Greek  studies  can  never  die. 
The  temporary  Dark  Age  of  the  last  few  years  which 
culminated  in  the  Great  War  is  giving  way  to  a  renais¬ 
sance  of  classical  studies.  And  this  is  indeed  fortunate 
for  the  world  of  today,  which  has  great  need  of  those 
eternal  gifts  of  beauty  and  truth,  of  good  taste  and 
moderation,  of  imagination  and  idealism  that  Athens, 
ancient  in  name  only,  can  bounteously  give  to  those 
who  have  eyes  to  see,  ears  to  hear,  and  heart  and  soul 
to  appreciate.  As  Shelley  sings: 

“  But  Greece  and  her  foundations  are 
Built  below  the  tide  of  war, 

Based  on  the  crystalline  sea 
Of  thought  and  its  eternity; 

Her  citizens,  imperial  spirits, 

Rule  the  present  from  the  past; 

On  all  this  world  of  men  inherits 
Their  seal  is  set.” 


CHAPTER  XX 

THE  GENIUS  OF  THE  GREEKS 

“  L’esprit  classique  est  la  culte  de  la  raison  claire  et  libre,  la 
recherche  de  la  beaute  harmonieuse  et  simple  dans  toutes  les 
manifestations  de  la  pensee.”  —  M.  Ribot. 

THE  preceding  chapters,  it  is  to  be  hoped,  have 
furnished  the  material  and  the  evidence  where¬ 
by  we  may  sum  up  some  of  the  most  important 
of  the  Greek  characteristics,  particularly  as  found  in 
the  Athenians.  What  were  their  chief  virtues?  What, 
of  permanent  value,  did  they  accomplish?  Wherein 
should  the  modern  world  emulate  them?  What  faults 
did  they  have  and  what  mistakes  did  they  make  which 
we  should  avoid? 

Of  all  the  Greeks  the  Athenians  were  the  most  highly 
gifted.  To  their  native  Ionian  liveliness,  versatility, 
imagination,  and  sense  of  humor  —  Gallic  characteris¬ 
tics  —  they  added  the  sterling  qualities  of  the  Dorians. 
Physically,  they  were  comely  and  energetic;  mentally, 
they  were  quick-witted  and  curious.  In  temperament 
they  were  generally  cheerful  and  light-hearted.  The 
conventional  and  popular  conception  of  the  Greeks  is 
erroneous,  however,  that  represents  them  as  an  utterly 
care-free  and  always  joyous  folk,  singing,  dancing,  and 
feasting  in  sheer  pagan  abandon.  Healthy  in  body  and 
mind,  they  enjoyed  life  sanely;  yet,  as  they  lived 
largely  in  and  for  the  present,  a  strain  of  melancholy 
and  sadness  is  frequently  to  be  observed  in  their  views 
of  sickness  and  old  age,  of  death  and  the  hereafter. 
Greek  literature  contains  numerous  passages  that  re¬ 
veal  a  keen  appreciation  of  the  vicissitudes  and  the  un¬ 
certainty,  the  pains  and  the  sorrows  that  are  insepar- 

287 


288 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


able  from  human  existence.  The  Greeks  took  life 
seriously,  but  not,  on  the  whole,  sadly. 

At  the  outset  we  are  struck  by  the  intellectuality  of 
the  Greeks  and  the  quality  and  the  power  of  their 
minds.  Modern  biologists  affirm  that  mankind  has 
made  no  advance,  so  far  as  mental  powers  and  ability 
are  concerned,  in  the  2300  years  that  separate  us  from 
Plato  and  Aristotle.  Professor  Conklin  says  ( Heredity 
and  Environment ,  p.  418):  “  There  has  been  no  per¬ 

ceptible  improvement  in  human  heredity  within  historic 
times.  Indeed  no  modern  race  of  men  is  the  equal  of 
certain  ancient  ones.  In  Attica  in  the  space  of  two 
centuries  there  appeared  such  a  galaxy  of  illustrious 
men  as  has  never  been  found  on  the  whole  earth  in  any 
two  centuries  since  that  time.  Gal  ton  concludes  that 
the  average  ability  of  the  Athenian  race  of  that  period 
was  on  the  lowest  possible  estimate  as  much  greater 
than  that  of  the  English  race  of  the  present  day  as  the 
latter  is  above  that  of  the  African  negro.” 

In  Greece,  and  especially  in  Athens,  for  the  first  time 
in  the  ancient  world,  intellect  and  reason  were  opera¬ 
tive  in  all  the  activities  of  life.  As  Herodotus  says 
(1.  60):  “The  Greeks  have  been  from  very  ancient 
times  distinguished  from  the  barbarians  by  superior 
sagacity  and  freedom  from  foolish  simpleness.  The 
Athenians  have  the  credit  of  surpassing  all  other  Greeks 
in  cleverness.”  As  a  result  of  this  rule  of  reason  they 
achieved  a  freedom  that  had  hitherto  been  unknown. 
They  had  freedom  in  religion,  which  meant  indepen¬ 
dence  of  the  compulsion  of  tradition,  of  the  restraint 
of  superstition  in  its  worst  aspects,  and  of  the  dictation 
of  priests  with  their  intellectually  crippling  dogmas  and 
formal  creeds.  The  winning  of  political  freedom  meant 
the  rise  of  the  Athenian  democracy,  and,  for  the  first 
time  in  history,  government  by  the  people.  Individual 
freedom  meant  the  opportunity  for  self-development 
and  self-expression  in  all  the  relations  of  life.  For  ex¬ 
ample,  every  Athenian  youth  was  free  to  choose  his  own 
career  and  to  make  the  most  of  it.  In  ancient  Athens, 


GENIUS  OF  THE  GREEKS 


289 


as  in  modern  America,  there  was  ample  opportunity  for 
the  “  self-made  ”  man. 

This  freedom  of  the  Greek,  however,  was  the  free¬ 
dom  of  the  individual  only  and  that  of  his  own  city- 
state  unrelated  to  the  rest  of  the  world.  The  Athenian 
was  an  intense  individualist.  He  had  broken  the 
shackles  which  prevent  man  from  achieving  indepen¬ 
dence  of  thought  and  action,  but  he  never  developed 
the  ability  to  work  successfully  and  harmoniously  with 
his  fellows.  He  was  impatient  of  discipline;  the  Spar¬ 
tan  education  found  no  popular  favor  at  Athens.  The 
Athenian  had  no  genius  for  organization.  The  govern¬ 
ment  of  Attica  in  many  of  its  domestic  features  of  ad¬ 
ministration,  e.g.,  the  financial  system,  seems  to  the 
modern  mind  amateurish  and  even  childish. 

This  trait  of  extreme  individualism  and  fierce  love 
of  independence,  characteristic  indeed  of  all  the  Greeks, 
explains  the  early  break-down  of  the  Athenian  Empire 
which  was  founded  upon  the  Delian  Confederacy.  The 
members  of  this  Confederation  were  not  generously  al¬ 
lowed  to  withdraw  when  dangers  were  past  nor  were 
they  treated  as  equals  by  the  Athenians.  The  citizens 
of  the  allied  states  were  not  given  Athenian  citizenship. 
Disaffection  naturally  arose,  followed  by  inevitable 
dissolution.  It  remained  for  Rome  to  give  to  the 
world  an  example  of  successful  organization  and  ad¬ 
ministration. 

Even  in  times  of  critical  danger  to  the  Greek  race 
as  a  whole  it  seemed  well-nigh  impossible  to  achieve 
concerted  action.  This  was  the  case  during  the  Persian 
invasions  when  a  united  army  of  the  Greeks  never  faced 
the  barbarians.  Despite  this  handicap  Greece  was  for¬ 
tunately  saved,  only  later  to  fall  a  victim  to  Macedonia 
because  of  interstate  jealousies  and  too  dearly  cherished 
independence  of  action.  Greek  teachers  and  philoso¬ 
phers  who  thought  and  spoke  in  terms  of  international¬ 
ism  and  racial  unity  were  rare.  Isocrates,  throughout 
his  long  career,  preached  Panhellenism  to  deaf  ears. 
Modern  writers  find  difficulty  in  understanding  this 


290  GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 

Athenian  characteristic.  For  example,  Theodore 
Roosevelt,  writing  to  Trevelyan  (Bishop,  Theodore 
Roosevelt  and  his  Time ,  2.  154)  says:  “  What  a  strange 
thing  it  is  that  those  wonderful  Greeks  .  .  .  lacked  the 
self-restraint  and  political  common-sense  necessary  to 
enable  them  to  hold  their  own  against  any  strong  ag¬ 
gressive  power.”  The  silence  of  Plato  and  Aristotle 
regarding  international  relations  in  their  discussions  of 
the  ideal  state  seems  inexplicable  and  regrettable  to 
some  moderns.  But  this  silence  is  explained  when  it  is 
realized  that  the  Athenian  thought  only  in  terms  of  the 
individual  city-state,  which  was  to  be  entirely  free, 
independent,  and  as  self-sufficient  as  possible.  And  the 
manifest  superiority  of  the  Athenians  in  all  things  ex¬ 
cept  the  possession  of  a  great  military  machine  —  a 
superiority  of  which  they  were  not  unaware  —  tended 
to  increase  their  natural  indifference  and  even  intoler¬ 
ance  toward  foreigners  outside  of  Attica  and  towards 
“  barbarians.” 

The  fearless  and  constant  application  of  intellect  and 
of  reason  to  life  in  all  its  aspects  resulted  in  the  begin¬ 
nings  of  science,  the  discovery  of  the  scientific  method, 
and  the  development  of  abstract  thinking.  While  it 
has  remained  for  the  modern  world  to  make  marvelous 
discoveries  and  to  develop  physical  science,  practically 
all  of  philosophy  in  all  its  varying  aspects  we  have  in¬ 
herited  from  the  Greeks.  With  curiosity  of  mind,  hun¬ 
ger  for  knowledge,  and  power  of  reason,  they  first  pur¬ 
sued  the  truth,  loving  it  for  its  own  sake. 

There  is  no  more  striking  feature  of  the  genius  of  the 
Greeks  than  their  originality.  This  is  strikingly  seen 
in  their  literature  with  its  manifold  types,  which  they 
not  only  invented  but  so  far  perfected  that  they  have 
served  ever  since  as  models.  This  perfection  of  form 
was  attained  not  only  in  epic,  lyric,  dramatic,  and  pas¬ 
toral  poetry,  but  also  in  the  matured  prose  style,  which 
was  admirably  suited  for  every  need  of  expression. 
Greek  literature,  furthermore,  both  prose  and  poetry, 
is  characterized  by  simplicity  of  handling,  directness 


GENIUS  OF  THE  GREEKS  291 

of  treatment,  lucidity  of  style,  conciseness  of  expres¬ 
sion,  and  objectivity. 

The  influence  of  this  literature  —  what  we  owe  to 
the  Greeks  in  this  field  of  human  endeavor  —  is  too 
great  for  adequate  discussion  here.  The  epic  poetry 
of  Homer  inspired  the  great  epics  of  Vergil,  Dante,  and 
Milton.  The  literature  of  Rome  has  formal  beginning 
in  the  translation  of  the  Odyssey  by  the  Greek,  Livius 
Andronicus.  Hesiod’s  didactic  poem,  the  Works  and 
Days ,  was  an  incentive  for  the  Georgies  of  Vergil,  while 
the  Bucolics  of  Rome’s  great  poet  and  the  pastorals 
of  Shelley  and  Tennyson  are  strongly  colored  by  the 
Idylls  of  Theocritus,  Bion,  and  Moschus.  Horace 
prides  himself  on  having  brought  to  Rome  the  Aeolic 
measures  of  Alcaeus  and  Sappho.  Attic  tragedy  is  the 
blood  and  sinew  of  the  Roman  Seneca,  whose  plays 
were  the  inspiration  for  French  classical  drama  and 
profoundly  influenced  English  dramatic  literature. 
Without  the  Greek  New  Comedy  of  Menander  and  his 
fellows  the  Roman  comedy  of  Terence  and  Plautus 
could  hardly  have  existed.  The  prose  style  of  Gorgias 
and  Isocrates,  the  oratorical  fire,  earnestness  and  mas¬ 
tery  of  Demosthenes,  the  histories  of  Herodotus  and 
Thucydides,  the  philosophical  writings  of  Plato  and 
Aristotle  —  all  have  given  to  Roman  and  modern 
writers  and  thinkers  ideas  for  inspiration  and  models 
for  imitation.  Even  the  modern  novel  is  not  without 
prototypes  in  the  romances  of  Achilles  Tatius,  Helio- 
dorus,  and  Longus,  and  the  dialogues  and  the  True 
History  of  Lucian. 

The  originality  and  inventiveness  of  the  Hellenes,  so 
manifest  in  their  literature,  may  be  seen  in  the  develop¬ 
ment  of  the  Orders  of  Architecture  and  in  the  construc¬ 
tion  of  their  temples;  these  qualities  may  be  admired 
in  their  sculpture  and  works  of  art  of  every  type  and 
description. 

To  the  modern  world  the  word  Greek  is  almost 
synonymous  with  the  word  Beauty  —  truly  a  remark¬ 
able  tribute  to  the  ancient  Hellenes.  It  may  be  that 


292 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


our  conception  in  this  matter  is  somewhat  exaggerated, 
and  that  impatience  and  disgust  with  the  imperfections 
and  the  ugliness  about  us  influence  us  to  idealize  the 
beauty  in  the  past.  If,  through  the  magic  of  Aladdin’s 
lamp,  it  were  granted  us  to  walk  the  streets  of  Periclean 
Athens,  no  doubt  we  should  observe  much  that  would 
seem  incompatible  with  our  dreams.  Ugliness  and  dirt 
are  not  of  today  only.  And  yet  nothing  is  more  certain 
than  that  in  general  the  instinct  for  the  creation  of  the 
beautiful  was  inherent  in  the  genius  of  the  Greek  people 
and  was  the  property  of  the  many  and  not  of  the  chosen 
or  the  trained  few.  This  beauty  is  not  a  refined  pretti¬ 
ness  that  loses  its  charm  nor  is  it  the  beauty  of  opulence 
and  ornateness  that  surfeits  and  cloys.  Greek  beauty 
is  the  achievement  of  good  taste  and  is  characterized 
by  simplicity  and  strength.  The  numerous  embodi¬ 
ments  of  it  which  the  world  fortunately  still  possesses 
are  objects  of  universal  admiration  and  imitation.  This 
element  of  beauty  is  conspicuous  in  the  temples  on  the 
Acropolis,  in  the  Panathenaic  frieze  of  the  Parthenon, 
in  the  contours  and  decoration  of  the  commonest  vase, 
and  in  the  coins  of  every-day  trade  and  commerce. 
Beauty  is  an  all-pervading  characteristic  of  the  Greek 
language  itself  and  of  the  Greek  literature,  a  beauty  of 
form,  expression,  and  ideas.  Underlying  Greek  beauty 
in  all  its  manifestations  is  the  feeling  for  symmetry  and 
harmony,  for  the  golden  mean,  for  good  taste  and  for 
the  becoming,  in  short,  for  sophrosyne,  a  quality  which 
is  at  the  very  basis  of  Greek  ethical  standards  and  be¬ 
havior.  These  characteristics  are  aptly  called  by  Swin¬ 
burne  ( Essay  on  Chapman ,  147),  “  those  Grecian  gifts 
of  perfect  form,  of  perfect  light,  and  of  perfect 
measure.” 

The  Greek  ideal  of  beauty,  as  it  may  be  seen  ex¬ 
pressed  in  their  monuments  and  literature,  seems  to 
some  moderns  too  cold  and  lacking  in  appeal.  Why  is 
this?  It  is  because  of  different  conceptions  which  them¬ 
selves  are  due  to  inherent  feeling  and  the  influence  of 
accumulated  tradition.  Greek  civilization,  largely  self- 


GENIUS  OF  THE  GREEKS 


293 


evolved  and  developed,  was  little  influenced  and  af¬ 
fected  by  outside  forces;  modern  civilization,  the  heir 
of  the  ages,  is  complex  in  the  extreme.  Realism  is  at 
the  very  basis  of  Hellenism;  idealism  has,  until  re¬ 
cently  at  any  rate,  dominated  the  modern  world.  Greek 
literature  and  art  are  largely  objective  in  the  best  sense; 
modern  literature  and  art  are  subjective.  Greek  classic 
reserve,  chaste  and  unemotional,  may  seem  cold  to  mod¬ 
ern  taste  formed  and  fed  by  emotionalism.  The  calm 
ending  of  an  Attic  tragedy,  the  quiet  and  dignified  close 
of  an  oration  of  Demosthenes,  the  simple  dignity  of  a 
Greek  statue,  the  severe  lines  of  a  Doric  temple,  the 
conciseness  of  a  Greek  lyric  —  all  these  manifestations 
of  the  Hellenic  temperament,  in  their  sanity  and  nor¬ 
mality,  may  lack  appeal  to  modern  feeling  and  taste 
which  have  been  taught  to  love  infinite  variety  and 
complexity,  restlessness,  and  even  exaggeration.  Thus 
Homer  writes  with  his  eye  upon  the  object,  as  Matthew 
Arnold  well  says,  and  paints  his  vivid  pictures  with  a 
few  telling  strokes  of  the  brush  and  colors  of  the  palette. 
Greek  lyric  poetry  poignantly  but  simply  expresses 
human  feeling  without  that  analysis  of  the  emotions 
characteristic  of  the  modern  lyric.  An  Attic  tragedy 
is  comparatively  simple  in  conception  and  execution, 
while  a  Shakespearian  drama  is  varied  and  complex, 
and  an  ultra-modern  play  may  be  and  often  is  startling 
and  sensational.  It  is  the  essential  normality,  the  sim¬ 
plicity,  and  the  truthfulness  of  Greek  works  of  art  that 
may  cause  them  to  lack  appeal  to  jaded  modern  feeling. 
Our  craze  for  novelty  in  the  arts  is  an  invitation  to  the 
portrayal  of  the  excessively  ornate  or  the  elaborate, 
even  the  representation  of  the  ugly  and  the  grotesque. 
The  simply  beautiful  has  ceased  to  attract.  This  surely 
is  but  a  temporary  aberration  of  the  modern  world  — 
it  is  a  passing  phase  that  will  be  followed  by  a  return 
to  truth  and  beauty.  And  it  is  to  the  Greeks  that  we 
shall  return,  insofar  as  we  are  indebted  to  them  for 
the  standards  and  the  canons  by  which  these  eternal 
virtues  are  to  be  tested  and  measured. 


294 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Athens  was  far  from  being  a  perfect  city  nor  were 
the  Athenians  free  from  grave  faults.  In  Athenian  his¬ 
tory  there  are  many  examples  of  the  fickleness  of  the 
populace  and  of  their  “  restless  meddlesomeness.”  Po¬ 
litical  venality,  personal  corruption,  the  blackmail  of  in¬ 
dividuals  by  informers,  juries  swayed  by  prejudice,  and 
instances  of  cruelty  were  not  unknown.  The  Athenians 
tolerated  slavery.  They  were  not  free  from  conceit. 
Not  a  few  were  the  victims  of  superstitions  and  vices. 
They  were  far  from  having  solved  the  many  problems 
of  the  human  race.  The  modern  world  is  a  richer  and 
a  better  world  in  many  respects  than  the  Grecian.  It 
would  indeed  be  a  cause  for  reproach,  and  even  despair, 
if  civilization  had  made  no  progress  in  two  thousand 
years  of  living  and  struggling!  We  have  added  much, 
and  done  much,  to  make  life  safer  and  more  comfort¬ 
able  for  the  individual,  easier  for  the  weak  and  infirm, 
and  richer  in  material  rewards  for  the  successful  and 
strong.  Why,  then,  is  it  profitable  for  us  to  study 
Greek  civilization?.  The  answer  is,  that  spiritual  prog¬ 
ress  has  not  kept  pace  with  material.  In  the  very 
wealth  and  struggle  of  modern  life  we  have  forgotten, 
or  we  ignore,  much  that  the  Greeks  knew  and  practiced 
whereby  life  was  made  happy,  spiritually  rich,  and 
better  worth  the  living.  The  Greeks  were  active  and 
energetic,  but  they  knew  how  to  enjoy  leisure.  To  live 
richly  was  more  important  to  them  than  to  get  riches. 

The  truth  is  that  we  are  in  great  need  today  of  cer¬ 
tain  Greek  virtues.  The  Greek  sense  of  beauty  must 
animate  all  the  people,  instead  of  the  few.  Greek  sim¬ 
plicity,  directness,  and  moderation  must  temper  modern 
complexity,  evasion,  and  extravagance.  Greek  insis¬ 
tence  upon  thoroughness  and  accuracy  should  replace 
the  prevailing  superficiality  and  sham.  Greek  love  and 
pursuit  of  the  truth  should  be  emulated.  Last  but  not 
least  Greek  good  taste  and  appreciation  of  the  becom¬ 
ing  in  all  of  life’s  relationships  the  modern  world  des¬ 
perately  needs. 

The  words  of  Sir  William  Osier,  scientist  and  physi- 


GENIUS  OF  THE  GREEKS 


295 


clan,  may  fittingly  close  this  chapter  and  this  book: 
“  As  true  today  as  in  the  fifth  century  b.c.  the  name  of 
Hellas  stands  no  longer  for  the  name  of  a  race,  but  as 
the  name  of  knowledge.  The  deep  rooting  of  our 
civilization  is  in  the  soil  of  Greece  —  much  of  our  dog¬ 
matic  religion,  practically  all  the  philosophies,  the 
models  of  our  literature,  the  ideals  of  our  democratic 
freedom,  the  fine  and  the  technical  arts,  the  funda¬ 
mentals  of  science.” 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  APPENDIX 


The  object  of  this  Appendix  is  to  give  the  titles  of  some  of  the 
most  important,  helpful,  and  recent  books  bearing  on  our  sub¬ 
ject.  These  books  are  mostly  in  English,  although  a  number 
of  important  French  and  German  works  are  included.  The 
general  bibliographical  list  is  followed  by  titles  of  books  and 
suggested  readings  of  special  value  for  the  topics  treated  in  the 
several  chapters  of  this  volume. 

GENERAL 


Art  and  Archaeology 

Fowler,  H.  N.,  and  Wheeler,  J.  R.,  Handbook  of  Greek 
Archaeology  (N.  Y.  1909), 

Gardner,  E.  A.,  Handbook  of  Greek  Sculpture  (2d  ed. 
Macmillan,  1915) 

Gardner,  Percy,  Principles  of  Greek  Art  (N.  Y.  1904) 
Murray,  A.  S.,  Handbook  of  Greek  Archaeology  (N.  Y. 
1892) 

Perrot  et  Chipiez,  Histoire  de  l’Art  dans  l’Antiquite  (Paris, 
1882-1914) 

Tarbell,  F.  B.,  History  of  Greek  Art  (Macmillan,  1896) 
For  Vases  and  Sculpture  see  titles  under  Chapters  V  and  VI 
Baumgarten,  Poland  und  Wagner,  Die  hellenische  Kultur 
(Leipzig,  1905) 

Becker-Goll,  Charicles  (3  vols.  Berlin,  1877-78) 

Becker,  W.  A.,  Charicles,  the  Private  Life  of  the  Ancient  Greeks 
(London,  1874) 

Bliimner,  H.,  Leben  und  Sitten  der  Griechen  (Leipzig,  1887) 
Botsford,  G.  W.,  and  Sihler,  E.  G.,  Hellenic  Civilization  (N.  Y. 

191s) 

British  Museum  Guide  to  the  exhibition  illustrating  Greek  and 
Roman  life  (2d  ed.  London,  1920) 

Casson,  G.,  Ancient  Greece  (Oxford  Univ.  Press,  1922) 
Companion  to  Greek  Studies,  ed.  by  Whibley  (3d  ed.  Cambridge, 
Eng.,  1916) 

Cotterill,  H.  B.,  Ancient  Greece  (N.  Y.  1913) 

Dictionaries,  Lexica,  and  Atlases 

Baumeister,  Denkmaler  des  klassischen  Altertums  (3  vols. 
Munich,  1884-1888) 


297 


298 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Daremberg  et  Saglio,  Dictionnaire  des  antiquites  grecques 
et  romaines  (Paris,  beginning  1873) 

Encyclopaedia  Britannica  (for  many  excellent  articles) 
Everyman  Library  Atlas 

Harper’s  Dictionary  of  Classical  Literature  and  Antiquities 
Muller,  Handbuch  der  klassischen  Altertums-wissenschaft 
(Munich) 

Pauly-Wissowa,  Real-Encyclopadie  der  klassischen  Alter¬ 
tums-wissenschaft  (Stuttgart) 

Roscher,  Lexikon  der  griechischen  und  romischen  Mythologie 
(Leipzig) 

Schreiber’s  Atlas  of  Classical  Antiquities  (ed.  by  Anderson, 
London,  1895) 

Sieglin,  Schulatlas  zur  Geschichte  des  Altertums  (Gotha, 
Perthes) 

Shepherd,  W.  R.,  Atlas  of  Ancient  History  (2d  ed.  N.  Y. 
1921) 

Smith,  W.,  Dictionaries  of  Greek  and  Roman  Antiquities, 
Biography  and  Mythology,  and  Geography 
Emmanuel,  M.,  La  danse  grecque  antique  (Paris,  1896) 

Fougeres,  G.,  La  vie  publique  et  privee  des  Grecs  et  des  Romains 
(Paris,  1894) 

Frazer,  J.  G.,  Pausanias’  Description  of  Greece  (6  vols.  3d  ed. 
London,  1913) 

Gardner  and  Jevons,  Manual  of  Greek  Antiquities  (2d  ed. 
London,  1898) 

Genius  of  the  Greeks  (see  titles  for  Chapter  XX) 

Gercke  und  Norden,  Einleitung  in  die  Altertums-wissenschaft 
(2  ed.,  Berlin,  1912--14) 

Giraud,  La  vie  privee  et  la  vie  publique  des  Grecs  (Paris,  1890) 
Guhl  und  Koner,  Das  Leben  der  Griechen  und  Romer  (6th  ed. 
Berlin,  1893) 

Guhl  and  Koner,  Life  of  the  Greeks  and  Romans  (N.  Y.  1875) 
Gulick,  C.  B.,  The  Life  of  the  Ancient  Greeks  (N.  Y.  1909) 
Hermann,  K.  F.,  Lehrbuch  der  griechischen  Privatal  ter  turner 
(3d  ed.  by  Blumner,  Freiburg,  1882) 

Hicks,  E.  L.,  and  Hill,  G.  F.,  Greek  Historical  Inscriptions 
(Rev.  ed.  Oxford,  1901) 

Histories  of  Greece 

Beloch,  K.  J.,  Griechische  Geschichte  (2d  ed.  Strassburg, 
1912-1916) 

Botsford,  G.  W.,  Hellenic  History  (N.  Y.  1922) 

Breasted,  J.  H.,  Ancient  Times  (N.  Y.  1916) 

Bury,  J.  B.,  History  cf  Greece  (Macmillan,  1913) 

Busolt,.  G.,  Griechische  Geschichte  (3  vols.  2d  ed.  Gotha, 
1893-1904) 

Curtius,  E.,  History  of  Greece  (5  vols.  N.  Y.  1907) 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  APPENDIX 


299 


Ferguson,  W.  S.,  Hellenistic  Athens  (Macmillan,  1911) 

-  Greek  Imperialism  (Boston,  1913) 

Freeman,  E.  A.,  History  of  Sicily  (4  vols.  Oxford,  1891-94) 
Gardner,  P.,  New  Chapters  in  Greek  History  (N.  Y.  1892) 
Glover,  T.  R.,  From  Pericles  to  Philip  (2d  ed.  London,  1918) 
Grote,  G.,  History  of  Greece  (12  vols.  Everyman’s  Library, 
1906) 

Grundy,  G.  B.,  The  Great  Persian  War  (London,  1901) 

-  Thucydides  and  the  History  of  His  Age  (London, 

1911) 

Holm,  A.,  History  of  Greece  (4  vols.  Macmillan,  1894-99) 
Meyer,  E.,  Geschichte  des  Altertums  (5  vols.  3d  ed.  Berlin, 
1910-13) 

Historical  Romances 

Davis,  W.  S.,  A  Victor  at  Salamis  (Macmillan,  1915) 
Gaines,  C.  K.,  Gorgo:  a  Romance  of  old  Athens  (Boston, 

1903) 

Robinson,  C.,  The  Days  of  Alkibiades  (N.  Y.  1916) 
Snedeker,  C.  D.,  The  Coward  of  Thermopylae  (N.  Y.  1911) 
James,  H.  R.,  Our  Hellenic  Heritage  (Vol.  I,  London,  1921,  Vol. 

II,  Athens,  her  Splendour  and  her  Fall.  1922) 

Jarde,  A.,  La  Grece  antique  et  la  vie  grecque  (Paris,  1914) 
Literature,  see  titles  under  Chapter  X 

Mahaffy,  J.  P.,  The  Silver  Age  of  the  Greek  World  (Chicago, 
1906) 

Muller,  Die  griechischen  Privataltertiimer  (Munich,  1893) 

Pater,  W.,  Greek  Studies  (Macmillan,  1895) 

Stobart,  J.  C.,  The  Glory  that  was  Greece  (2d  ed.  Philadelphia, 

1915) 

Translations  of  Greek  Literature,  see  titles  under  Chapter  X 
Tucker,  T.  G.,  Life  in  Ancient  Athens  (Macmillan,  1906) 

Ure,  P.  N.,  The  Origin  of  Tyranny  (Cambridge,  Eng.,  1922) 
Whibley,  L.,  Companion  to  Greek  Studies  (3d  ed.  Cambridge, 
Eng.,  1916) 

Zimmern,  Alice,  The  Home  Life  of  the  Ancient  Greeks;  a  trans¬ 
lation  of  Bliimner  (London,  1895) 


CHAPTER  I.  SOURCES  OF  INFORMATION 

Botsford  and  Sihler,  Hellenic  Civilization,  Chapter  I. 

Gardner,  P.,  New  Chapters  in  Greek  History  (N.  Y.  1892) 
Marshall,  F.  H.,  Discovery  in  Greek  Lands:  A  Sketch  of  the 
Principal  Excavations  and  Discoveries  of  the  last  50  years 
(Cambridge,  Eng.,  1920) 

See  Bibliography  under  Chapter  XIX 


300 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


CHAPTER  II.  GREEK  STATES  APART  FROM  ATTICA 

Gulick,  C.  B.,  Life  of  the  Ancient  Greeks,  Chapter  I 
Botsford,  G.  W.,  Hellenic  History,  Chapter  I 
Companion  to  Greek  Studies  (ed.  by  L.  Whibley),  Chapter  I.  i 
James,  H.  R.,  Our  Hellenic  Heritage,  I.  Chapter  II,  pp.  16-34 
Myres,  J.  L.,  Greek  Lands  and  the  Greek  People  (Oxford,  1910) 
Zimmern,  A.  E.,  The  Greek  Commonwealth  (3d  ed.  Oxford,  1922) 
Travel  and  Description 

Allinson,  F.  G.,  and  A.  C.  E.,  Greek  Lands  and  Letters  (2d 
ed.  N.  Y.  1922) 

Baud-Bovy,  D.,  and  Boissonas,  F.,  In  Greece:  Journeys  by 
Mountain  and  Valley  (with  40  plates.  London,  1922) 
Hogarth,  D.  G.,  Accidents  of  an  Antiquary’s  Life  (Mac¬ 
millan,  1910) 

Manatt,  J.  I.,  Aegean  Days  (N.  Y.  1914) 

Marden,  P.  S.,  Greece  and  the  Aegean  Islands  (N.  Y.  1907J 
Richardson,  R.  B.,  Vacation  Days  in  Greece  (N.  Y.  1904) 


CHAPTER  III.  ATTICA  AND  ATHENS 

Bosanquet,  Mrs.  R.  C.,  Days  in  Attica;  Modern  Life  (London, 
1914) 

Companion  to  Greek  Studies,  I.  1. 

D’Ooge,  M.  L.,  The  Acropolis  of  Athens  (Macmillan,  1908) 
Frazer,  J.  G.,  Pausanias  (3d  ed.  1913) 

Gardner,  E.  A.,  Ancient  Athens  (Macmillan,  1902) 

Gulick,  C.  B.,  Life  of  the  Ancient  Greeks,  Chapter  II. 

Judeich,  W.,  Topographie  von  Athen  (Munich,  1905) 

Weller,  C.  H.,  Athens  and  its  Monuments  (Macmillan,  1913) 

CHAPTER  IV.  ARCHITECTURE  AND  MONUMENTS 

OF  ATHENS 

Anderson  and  Spiers,  The  Architecture  of  Greece  and  Rome 
Blomfield,  R.,  Greek  Architecture  (in  the  Legacy  of  Greece,  ed. 
by  R.  W.  Livingstone) 

Dinsmoor,  W.  B.,  The  Entrance  to  the  Acropolis  (In  Prepa¬ 
ration) 

D’Ooge,  M.  L.,  The  Acropolis  of  Athens  (N.  Y.  1909) 
Elderkin,  G.  W.,  Problems  in  Periclean  Buildings  (Princeton, 
1912) 

Erechtheum,  Description  of,  with  Atlas  of  Plates  (In  Prepa- 
ration) 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  APPENDIX 


301 


Fowler  and  Wheeler,  Handbook  of  Greek  Archaeology  (see  also 
bibliographies  therein) 

Frazer,  J.  G.,  Pausanias. 

Gulick,  C.  B.,  Life,  Chapter  IV. 

Harrison  and  Verrall,  Mythology  and  Monuments  of  Ancient 
Athens  (N.  Y.  1894) 

Jahn  and  Michaelis,  Arx  Athenarum  a  Pausania  descripta  in 
usum  scholarum  (Bonn,  1901) 

Marquand,  A.,  Greek  Architecture  (N.  Y.  1909) 

Springer,  A.,  Die  Kunst  des  Altertums  (nth  ed.  Leipzig,  1920) 
Warren,  H.  L.,  The  Foundations  of  Classic  Architecture  (N.  Y. 
1919) 

Weller,  C.  H.,  Athens  and  its  Monuments  (N.  Y.  1913) 
Vitruvius,  Ten  Books  on  Architecture,  translated  by  Morgan, 
M.  H.,  and  illustrations  by  Warren,  H.  L.,  (Harvard  Press, 
1914) 


CHAPTER  V.  HOUSE,  FURNITURE,  AND  VASES 

Companion  to  Greek  Studies,  VII.  8 
Dictionaries  and  Manuals  of  Antiquities 
Gulick,  C.  B.,  Life,  Chapter  III. 

Rider,  B.  C.,  The  Greek  House  (Cambridge,  Eng.,  1916) 
Furniture  and  Utensils 
Gulick,  Life,  Chapter  X. 

Ransom,  C.  L.,  Studies  in  Ancient  Furniture  (Chicago, 

1905) 

Vases  and  Vase-Painting 

Baumeister,  Denkmaler,  article  Vasenkunde. 

Beazley,  J.  D.,  Attic  Red-figured  Vases  in  American 
Museums  (Oxford,  1918) 

Buschor,  E.,  Greek  Vase-Painting  (London,  1921) 
Companion  to  Greek  Studies,  IV.  5. 

Fairbanks,  A.,  Athenian  White  Lekythoi  (Macmillan,  1914) 
Fowler  and  Wheeler,  Greek  Archaeology,  pp.  412-525  (and 
bibliography) 

Goodyear,  W.  H.,  Greek  Refinements  (Yale  Univ.  Press, 
1912) 

Herford,  M.  A.  B.,  Handbook  of  Greek  Vase-Painting 
(N.  Y.  1919) 

Hoppin,  J.  C.,  Handbook  of  Attic  Red-figured  Vases  (2  vols. 
Oxford,  1919) 

Pottier,  E.,  Catalogue  des  Vases  antiques  de  terre-cuite  au 
Musee  du  Louvre  (Pt.  1.  Paris,  1896) 

- Douris  and  the  Painters  of  Greek  Vases  (N.  Y. 

1916) 


302 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Richter,  Gisela  M.  A.,  The  Craft  of  Athenian  Pottery  (Yale 
Univ.  Press,  1922) 

Walters,  H.  B.,  History  of  Greek  Pottery  (Murray,  1905) 


CHAPTER  VI.  SCULPTURE 


Arndt,  P.,  Griechische  und  romische  Portrats  (Munich,  1909-  ) 
Brunn,  H.,  and  Arndt,  P.,  Denkmaler  griechischer  und  romischer 
Sculp tur  (Munich,  1888-1902) 

Carpenter,  Rhys,  The  Esthetic  Basis  of  Greek  Art  (Bryn  Mawr, 
1921) 

Catalogue  of  the  Acropolis  Museum:  Vol.  I,  G.  Dickens;  Vol.  II, 
S.  Casson  (Cambridge,  Eng.,  1912-21) 

Collignon,  M.,  Les  Statues  funeraires  dans  l’Art  grec  (Paris, 
1911) 

Conze,  A.  C.  L.,  Die  attische  Grabreliefs  (Berlin,  1893) 

Dickins,  G.,  Hellenistic  Sculpture  (Oxford,  1920) 

Fowler,  H.  N.,  and  Wheeler,  J.  R.,  Greek  Archaeology  (N.  Y. 
1909) 

Furtwangler,  A.,  Masterpieces  of  Greek  Sculpture  (N.  Y.  1895) 
Furtwangler,  A.,  and  Ulrichs,  H.  L.,  Greek  and  Roman  Sculpture 


(N.  Y.  1914) 


Gard  Handbook  of  Greek  Sculpture  (2d  ed.  N.  Y. 


-  Six  Greek  Sculptors  (London,  1910) 

Gardner,  P.,  Sculptured  Tombs  of  Hellas  (N.  Y.  1896) 

- The  Lamps  of  Greek  Art:  in  The  Legacy  of  Greece, 

ed.  by  R.  W.  Livingstone 

Hekler,  A.,  Greek  and  Roman  Portraits  (N.  Y.  1912) 

Joubin,  A.,  La  Sculpture  grecque  entre  les  guerres  mediques  et 
Pepoque  de  Phidias  (Paris,  1901) 

Hyde,  W.  W.,  Olympic  Victor  Monuments  and  Greek  Athletic 
Art  (Carnegie  Institute  of  Washington,  1921) 

Jex-Blake,  K.,  and  Sellers,  E.,  The  Elder  Pliny’s  Chapters  on 
the  History  of  Art  (London,  N.  Y.  1896) 

Jones,  H.  S.,  Select  Passages  from  Ancient  Authors  illustrative 
of  the  History  of  Greek  Sculpture  (London,  1895) 

Lechat,  H.,  La  Sculpture  attique  avant  Phidias  (Paris,  1904) 
Loewy,  E.,  Nature  in  Greek  Art  (London,  1907) 

■ -  Die  griechische  Plastik  (Leipzig,  1911) 

von  Mach,  E.,  A  Handbook  of  Greek  and  Roman  Sculpture 
(Boston,  1905) 

Overbeck,  J.  H.,  Geschichte  der  griechischen  Plastik  (3d  ed. 
Leipzig,  1881-2) 

Orbis  Pictus,  Band  3,  Archaische  Plastik  der  Griechen  (Berlin) 
Powers,  H.  H.,  The  Message  of  Greek  Art  (N.  Y.  1913) 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  APPENDIX  303 

Reinach,  S.,  Repertoire  de  la  statuaire  grecque  et  romains  (I-IV, 
Paris,  1897-1910) 

-  Repertoire  de  reliefs  grecs  et  romains  (I— III.  Paris, 

1909-12) 

Richter,  G.  M.  A.,  Handbook  of  the  Classical  Collection  of  the 
Metropolitan  Museum  of  Art  of  N.  Y.  (N.  Y.  1917) 

Walters,  H.  B.,  The  Art  of  the  Greeks  (N.  Y.  1906) 

Warrack,  J.,  Greek  Sculpture,  (London,  1912) 

CHAPTER  VII.  ATHLETIC  SPORTS  AND  FESTIVALS 
Companion  to  Greek  Studies,  V.  2 

Gardiner,  E.  N.,  Greek  Athletic  Sports  and  Festivals  (Mac¬ 
millan,  1910) 

Gulick,  Life,  pp.  91-105 

Hyde,  W.  W.,  Olympic  Victor  Monuments  and  Greek  Athletic 
Art  (Washington,  D.  C.,  1921.  Carnegie  Institution  Publ.) 

CHAPTER  VIII.  POLITICAL,  SOCIAL  AND  ECONOMIC 
CONDITIONS  OF  THE  ATHENIAN  PEOPLE 

Abrahams,  E.  B.,  Greek  Dress  (London,  1908) 

Barker,  E.,  Greek  Political  Theory;  Plato  and  his  Predecessors 
London,  1918) 

Boeckh,  A.,  Die  Staatshaushaltung  der  Athener  (3d  ed.  Berlin, 
1886) 

Caldwell,  W.  E.,  Hellenic  Conceptions  of  Peace  (N.  Y.  1919) 
Clerc,  M.,  Les  meteques  atheniens  (Paris,  1893) 

Companion  to  Greek  Studies,  ed.  by  Whibley 

Croiset,  M.,  Aristophanes  and  the  Political  Parties  at  Athens; 

translated  by  Loeb  (Macmillan,  1909) 

Donaldson,  J.,  Woman  in  Ancient  Greece  (Longmans,  1907) 
Evans,  M.  M.,  Chapters  on  Greek  Dress  (Macmillan,  1893) 
Ferguson,  W.  S.,  Greek  Imperialism  (Houghton  Mifflin,  1913) 
Fowler,  W.  W.,  The  City-State  of  the  Greeks  and  Romans  (Mac¬ 
millan,  1907) 

Francotte,  H.,  L’lndustrie  dans  la  Grece  ancienne  (2  vols. 
Brussels,  1900) 

Gardner,  P.,  A  History  of  Ancient  Coinage  (700-300  b.c.) 
(Oxford,  1918) 

Gilbert,  G.,  Constitutional  Antiquities  of  Sparta  and  Athens 

(189s) 

Glotz,  G.,  La  solidarity  de  la  famille  dans  le  droit  criminel  en 
Grece  (Paris,  1904) 

- Etudes  sociales  et  juridiques  sur  l’antiquite  grecque 

(Paris,  1906) 


304 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


-  Le  travail  dans  la  Grece  ancienne  (Paris,  1920) 

Greenidge,  A.  H.  J.,  Handbook  of  Greek  Constitutional  History 
(Macmillan,  1902) 

Guiraud,  P.,  La  main  d’oeuvre  industrielle  dans  Pancienne  Grece 
(Paris,  1900) 

Gulick,  Life  of  the  Ancient  Greeks,  pp.  60-70;  206-215;  227- 
250 

Lipsius,  J.  H.,  Das  attische  Recht  und  Rechtsverfahren,  based 
on  Meier  und  Schomann  (Leipzig,  1905) 

Meier  und  Schomann,  Der  attische  Prozess  (Revised  by  Lipsius, 
Leipzig,  1905) 

Meyer,  E.,  Die  Sklaverei  im  Altertum  (in  Kleine  Schrijten) 
Putnam,  E.  J.,  The  Lady  (N.  Y.  1910) 

Raeder,  A.  H.,  L ’arbitrage  international  chez  les  Hellenes  (N.  Y. 
1912) 

Roper,  A.  G.,  Ancient  Eugenics  (Oxford,  1913) 

Tod,  M.  N.,  International  Arbitration  amongst  the  Greeks 
(Oxford,  1913) 

Trever,  A.  G.,  History  of  Greek  Economic  Thought  (Chicago, 
1916) 

Van  Hook,  La  Rue,  The  Degradation  in  Meaning  of  Certain 
Greek  Words  ( Classical  Journal ,  May,  1916) 

- The  Exposure  of  Infants  in  Ancient  Athens  {Trans.  Arner . 

Phil.  Assoc.,  1920) 

Zimmern,  A.  E.,  The  Greek  Commonwealth  (Oxford,  3d  ed. 
1922) 

- Greek  Political  Thought:  in  The  Legacy  of  Greece,  ed.  by 

R.  W.  Livingstone  (1921) 


CHAPTER  IX.  WRITING  AND  BOOKS 

Birt,  T.,  Das  antike  Buchwesen  (Berlin,  1882) 

- Die  Buchrolle  in  der  Kunst  (Leipzig,  1907) 

Companion  to  Greek  Studies,  Chapter  VII.  4 
Gulick,  Life,  pp.  108-112 

Hall,  F.  W.,  Companion  to  Classical  Texts  (London,  1913) 
Murray,  G.,  The  Tradition  of  Greek  Literature  (in  Cooper,  The 
Greek  Genius  and  its  Influence) 

Putnam,  G.  H.,  Authors  and  their  Public  in  Ancient  Times  (N.  Y. 
1894 

Thompson,  E.  M.,  An  Introduction  to  Greek  and  Latin  Palaeog¬ 
raphy  (Oxford,  1912) 

White,  J.  W.,  The  Scholia  on  the  Aves  of  Aristophanes:  Intro¬ 
duction  (Boston,  1914) 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  APPENDIX 


305 


CHAPTER  X.  GREEK  LITERATURE 

Histories  of  Greek  Literature 

Capps,  E.,  From  Homer  to  Theocritus  (Scribner,  1901) 
Christ-Schmid,  Geschichte  der  griechischen  Litteratur 
(Munich,  1908-  ) 

Columbia  University  Lectures  on  Greek  Literature  (N.  Y. 
1912) 

Croiset,  A.  and  M.,  Histoire  de  la  litterature  grecque  (5  vols. 
Paris,  1896-99) 

Fowler,  H.  N.,  Ancient  Greek  Literature  (2d  ed.  N.  Y.,  1923) 
Krumbacher,  K.,  Geschichte  der  byzantinischen  Litteratur 
(2d  ed.  Munich,  1897) 

Murray,  G.,  Ancient  Greek  Literature  (N.  Y.  1897) 

Susemihl,  F.,  Geschichte  der  griechischen  Litteratur  in  der 
Alexandrinerzeit  (2  vols.  1891) 

Wright,  W.  C.,  A  Short  History  of  Greek  Literature  (N.  Y. 
1907) 

Other  Works 

Arnold,  M.,  On  Translating  Homer  (in  Essays  Literary  and 
Critical) 

Blass,  F.,  Geschichte  der  attischen  Beredsamkeit  (4  vols. 
2d  ed.  1887-93,  Teubner) 

Bruns,  I.,  Das  literarische  Portrat  der  Griechen  (Berlin, 
1896) 

Bury,  J.  B.,  The  Ancient  Greek  Historians  (Macmillan, 
1909) 

Dobson,  J.  F.,  The  Greek  Orators  (N.  Y.  1920) 

Haigh,  A.  E.,  The  Tragic  Drama  of  the  Greeks  (Oxford, 
1896) 

Jebb,  R.  C.,  Classical  Greek  Poetry  (Macmillan,  1893) 

- The  Attic  Orators  (2  vols.  2d  ed.  Macmillan,  1893) 

- Essays  and  Addresses  (Cambridge,  Eng.,  1907) 

- Homer  (Boston,  1890) 

Lang,  A.,  The  World  of  Homer  (N.  Y.  1910) 

Livingstone,  R.  W.,  Greek  Literature  (in  The  Legacy  of 
Greece,  Oxford,  1921) 

Lodge,  G.,  Greek  Influence  on  Latin  Literature  (in  Columbia 
Univ.  Lectures  on  Greek  Lit.) 

Mackail,  J.  W.,  Lectures  on  Greek  Poetry  (2d  ed.  Long¬ 
mans,  1911) 

Murray,  G.,  The  Rise  of  the  Greek  Epic  (2d  ed.  Oxford, 
1911) 

Norden,  E.,  Die  antike  Kunstprosa  (2  vols.  2d  ed.,  Leipzig, 
1915-J8) 

Norwood,  G.,  Greek  Tragedy  (Boston,  1920) 


306 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Perry,  E.  D.,  Greek  Lyric  Poetry  (in  Columbia  Univ. 

Lectures  on  Greek  Literature) 

Powell,  J.  U.,  New  Chapters  in  the  History  of  Greek  Litera¬ 
ture  (Oxford,  1921) 

Rohde,  E.,  Der  griechische  Roman  (Leipzig,  1914) 

Scott,  J.  A.,  The  Unity  of  Homer  (Berkeley,  Cal.,  1921) 
Shorey,  P.,  Chapter  I  in  Columbia  Univ.  Lectures  on  Greek 
Literature 

Stemplinger,  E.,  Das  Plagiat  in  der  griechischen  Litteratur 
(Leipzig,  1912) 

Symonds,  J.  A.,  Studies  of  the  Greek  Poets  (3d  ed.  London, 
1902) 

Teichmliller,  G.,  Literarische  Fehden  (Breslau,  1881-4) 
Tyrrell,  R.  Y.,  Essays  on  Greek  Literature  (London,  1909) 
Van  Hook,  La  Rue,  Greek  Literature  (article  in  the  Ency¬ 
clopaedia  Americana,  vol.  13) 

Volkmann,  R.,  Rhetorik  der  Griechen  und  Romer  (Munich) 

English  Literature  and  the  Classics 

Amos,  F.  R.,  Early  Theories  of  Translation  (N.  Y.  1920) 
Bywater,  F.,  Four  Centuries  of  Greek  Learning  in  England 
(Oxford,  1919) 

Campbell,  L.,  Tragic  Drama  in  Aeschylus,  Sophocles,  and 
Shakespeare  (N.  Y.  1904) 

Collins,  J.  C.,  Greek  Influence  on  English  Poetry  (London, 
1910) 

Cooper,  L.,  Aristotle  on  the  Art  of  Poetry  (N.  Y.  1913) 

- Two  Views  of  Education  (New  Haven,  Conn.,  1922) 

Foster,  F.  M.  K.,  English  Translations  from  the  Greek: 

A  Bibliographical  Survey  (N.  Y.  1918) 

Goad,  C.,  Horace  in  the  English  Literature  of  the  18th  Cent. 
(New  Haven,  1918) 

Goldmark,  R.  I.,  Studies  in  the  Influence  of  the  Classics  on 
English  Literature:  Jonson,  Landor,  Arnold  (N.  Y.  1918) 
Gordon,  G.  S.,  English  Literature  and  the  Classics  (Oxford, 
1912) 

Harrison,  J.  S.,  Platonism  in  English  Poetry  of  the  16th 
and  17th  Centuries  (Columbia  Univ.  Press) 

Kerlin,  J.  S.,  Theocritus  in  English  Literature  (Lynchburg, 
Va.,  1910) 

Mustard,  W.  P.,  Classical  Echoes  in  Tennyson  (N.  Y. 
1904) 

Nitchie,  E.,  Vergil  and  the  English  Poets  (Columbia  Univ. 
Press) 

- Browning’s  Use  of  the  Classics  ( Classical  Weekly, 

Jan.  31,  1921) 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  APPENDIX  307 

Osgood,  C.  G.,  The  Classical  Mythology  of  Milton’s  English 
Poems  (N.  Y.  1900) 

Rohde,  E.,  Der  gdechische  Roman  (Leipzig,  1914) 

Root,  R.  K.,  Classical  Mythology  in  Shakespeare  (N.  Y. 

1903) 

Shorey,  P.,  Lecture  I  in  Columbia  Univ.  Lectures  on  Greek 
Lit. 

Stapfer,  P.,  Shakespeare  and  Classical  Antiquity  (London, 
1880) 

Thayer,  M.  R.,  The  Influence  of  Horace  on  the  Chief  Eng¬ 
lish  Poets  of  the  19th  Century  (Cornell  Diss.) 

Tucker,  T.  G.,  The  Foreign  Debt  of  English  Literature 
(N.  Y.  1907) 

Van  Hook,  La  Rue,  Metaphorical  Terminology  of  Greek 
Rhetoric  and  Literary  Criticism  (Chicago,  1904) 

- Greek  Rhetorical  Terminology  in  Puttenham’s  Arte  of 

English  Poesie  (in  Trans.  Am.  Phil.  Assoc.  45) 

- Frigidity  as  a  Vice  of  Style  in  the  Ancient  Literary 

Critics  ( Clas .  Philology ,  vol.  12) 

Watt,  L.  M.,  Attic  and  Elizabethan  Tragedy  (N.  Y.  1908) 
Wolff,  S.  L.,  Romances  in  Elizabethan  Prose  Fiction  (N.  Y. 
1912) 

English  Translations  of  the  Chief  Greek  Authors 
Achilles  Tatius,  Gaselee,  S.  (Loeb  Classical  Library) 
Aeschines,  Orations,  Adams,  C.  D.  (Loeb  Library) 
Aeschylus,  Tragedies,  Way,  A.  S.  (Verse) ;  Morshead 
(Verse);  Campbell  (Verse);  Plumptre  (Verse).  Aga¬ 
memnon,  Murray,  G.  (Verse);  Browning,  R.  (Verse). 
Prometheus,  Browning,  E.  B.  (Verse);  Oresteian  Trilogy, 
Morshead,  The  House  of  Atreus  (Verse);  Smyth,  H.  W. 
(Prose,  Loeb  Library) 

Alcaeus,  in  Lyra  Graeca,  Edmonds,  J.  M.  (Loeb  Library) 
Anacreontics,  Moore,  T.  (Verse) 

Anthology,  Paton,  W.  R.  (5  vols.  Loeb  Library);  Mac- 
kail,  J.,  Select  Epigrams;  Leaf,  W.,  Little  Poems  from  the 
Greek 

Apollonius  of  Rhodes,  Coleridge,  E.  P.  (Prose);  Seaton, 
R.  C.  (Loeb  Library) 

Appian’s  Roman  History,  White,  H.  (4  vols.) 

Aratus,  Mair,  G.  R.  (Loeb  Library) 

Aristophanes,  Comedies,  Text  with  Translation  and  Notes 
by  Rogers,  B.  B.,  each  play  in  separate  vol.  Hickie,  W.  J. 
(Prose,  Bohn  Library);  Frere,  J.  H.,  Select  Plays 
(Verse) ;  Frogs,  Murray,  G.  (Verse) 

Aristotle,  Ethics,  Welldon;  Politics,  Jowett;  Rhetoric,  Jebb 
(Sandys);  Poetics, Butcher,  S.  H.;  Bywater,!.;  Cooper, L.; 


308 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


Constitution  of  Athens,  Kenyon,  F.  G.;  De  Anima,  Wal¬ 
lace  E.;  Hicks,  R.  D.;  Historia  Animalium,  Thompson, 
D.  W. 

Athenaeus,  Yonge,  C.  D.  (3  vols.  Bohn  Library) 
Bacchylides,  Jebb,  R.  C.  (Prose) 

Bion  and  Moschus,  and  Theocritus,  Lang,  A.  (Prose) 
Callimachus ,  Mair,  A.  W.  (Loeb  Library) 

Clement  of  Alexandria,  Butterworth,  G.  W.  (Loeb  Library) 
Daphne  and  Chloe,  Thornley,  rev.  by  Edmonds,  J.  M. 
(Loeb  Library) 

Demetrius,  On  Style,  Roberts,  W.  R. 

Demosthenes,  Kennedy,  C.  R.;  Public  Orations,  Pickard- 
Cambridge 

Dio’s  Roman  History,  Cary,  E.  (Loeb  Library) 

Dionysius  of  Halicarnassus,  Three  Literary  Letters,  Roberts, 
W.  R.;  On  Literary  Composition,  Roberts,  W.  R. 
Empedocles,  Leonard,  W.  E.  (Verse) 

Epictetus,  Crossley,  H.;  Long,  G. 

Euripides,  entire,  Way,  A.  S.  (Verse,  Loeb  Library) ; 

Murray,  G.  (Verse) ;  Cyclops,  Shelley,  P.  B. 

Galen,  On  the  Natural  Faculties,  Brock,  A.  J.  (Loeb 
Library) 

Greek  Poets  in  English  Verse,  ed.  by  Appleton,  W.  H. 
Greek  Poets,  An  Anthology,  Dole,  N.  H. 

Herodotus,  Rawlinson,  G.;  Macaulay,  G.  C.;  Godley,  A.  D. 
(Loeb  Library) 

Hesiod,  Mair,  A.  W.;  Evelyn-White,  H.  G.  (Loeb  Library) 
Homer,  Iliad,  Lang,  Leaf,  and  Myers  (Prose) ;  Bryant 
(Verse) ;  Derby  (Verse) ;  Way  (Verse) 

■ - Odyssey,  Butcher  and  Lang  (Prose);  Palmer,  G.  H.; 

Bryant  (Verse);  Way  (Verse);  Mackail  (Verse);  Murray, 
A.  T.  (Loeb  Library) 

Homeric  Hymns,  Evelyn- White,  H.  G.  (Loeb  Library) ; 

Shelley,  P.  B.  (in  part) 

Hypereides,  Kenyon,  F.  G. 

Isaeus,  Jones,  W. 

Isocrates,  Dimsdale,  J.  (revised  by  Young) ;  Freese,  J.  H. 
( vol.  I) 

Julian,  Wright,  W.  C.  (Loeb  Library) 

Longinus,  On  the  Sublime,  Roberts,  W.  R.;  Prickard,  A.  O. 
Longus,  Daphnis  and  Chloe,  Edmonds,  J.  M.  (Loeb  Library) 
Lucian,  Fowler,  H.  W.  and  F.  G.;  Harmon,  A.  H.  (Loeb 
Library) 

Lyric  Poets,  Edmonds,  J.  M.  (Loeb  Library) 

Marcus  Aurelius  Antoninus,  Rendall,  G.  H.;  Haines,  C.  R. 

(Loeb  Library) 

Meleager,  Headlam,  W. 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  APPENDIX 


309 


Menander,  Allinson,  F.  G.  (Loeb  Library) 

Pausanias,  Frazer,  J.  G.;  Jones,  W.  H.  S.  (Loeb  Library) 
Philostratus  and  Eunapius,  The  Lives  of  the  Sophists ; 

Wright,  W.  C.  (Loeb  Library) 

Pindar,  Myers,  E.  (Prose) ;  Sandys,  J.  (Prose,  Loeb  Library) 
Plato,  Jowett,  B.  (5  vols.):  Four  Socratic  Dialogues,  Jowett, 
with  preface  by  Caird;  Republic,  Davies  and  Vaughan; 
Euthyphro,  Apology,  Crito ,  Phaedo,  and  Phaedrus, 
Fowler,  H.  N.  (Loeb  ibrary) ;  Theaetetus  and  Sophist , 
Fowler,  H.  N.  (Loeb  Library) 

Plutarch,  Clough;  Perrin,  B.  (Loeb  Library) 

Polybius,  Shuckburgh,  E.  S.;  Paton,  W.  R.  (Loeb  Library) 
Procopius,  Dewing,  H.  B.  (Loeb  Library) 

Quintus  Smyrnaeus,  Way,  A.  S.  (Verse,  Loeb  Library) 
Sappho,  Wharton,  H.  T.  (Various  Verse  Translations) ;  in 
Lyra  Graeca,  Edmonds,  J.  M.  (Loeb  Library) 

Sophocles,  Jebb,  R.  C.  (Prose);  Way  (Verse);  Campbell 
(Verse);  Plumptre  (Verse);  Storr,  F.  (Loeb  Library); 
Oedipus,  King  of  Thebes,  Murray,  G.  (Verse) 

Strabo,  Falconer  and  Hamilton;  Jones,  H.  L.  (Loeb  Library) 
Theocritus,  Calverley  (Verse) ;  Lang,  A.  (Prose) ;  Way, 
A.  S.  (Verse);  Edmonds,  J.  M.  (Loeb  Library) 
Theophrastus,  Characters,  Jebb,  revised  by  Sandys;  Enquiry 
into  Plants,  Hort,  A.  (Loeb  Library) 

Thucydides,  Jowett,  B.;  Smith,  C.  F.  (Loeb  Library) 
Xenophon,  Dakyns,  H.  G.  Cyropaedia,  Miller,  W.  (Loeb 
Library) ;  Hellenica,  Brownson  (Loeb  Library) 

CHAPTER  XI.  EDUCATION 

Bosanquet,  B.,  Education  of  the  Young  in  Plato’s  Republic 
(Cambridge,  1908) 

Capes,  W.  W.,  University  Life  in  Ancient  Athens:  The  Ephebes 
(London,  1877) 

Companion  to  Greek  Studies,  Chapter  VII.  3 

Drever,  J.,  Greek  Education:  its  Practice  and  Principles  (Cam¬ 
bridge,  1912) 

Freeman,  K.  J.,  The  Schools  of  Hellas  (Macmillan,  1907) 

Girard,  P.,  L ’Education  athenienne  (2d  ed.  Paris,  1891) 

Gulick,  Life,  pp.  71-90;  105-m 

Monroe,  P.,  Sourcebook  of  the  History  of  Education:  Greek  and 
Roman  (N.  Y.  1902) 

Nettleship,  R.  L.,  Theory  of  Education  in  Plato’s  Republic  (in 
E.  Abbott’s  Hellenica,  pp.  67  ff.) 

Walden,  J.  W.  H.,  The  Universities  of  Ancient  Greece  (N.  Y. 
1909) 


310 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


CHAPTER  XII.  THEATER  AND  PRODUCTION 

OF  PLAYS 

Theater,  Physical  Aspects 

Allen,  J.  T.,  The  Greek  Theater  of  the  Fifth  Century  b.c. 
(Berkeley,  Cal.,  1920) 

Bieber,  M.,  Die  Denkmaler  zum  Theaterwesen  im  Altertum 
(Berlin,  1920) 

Capps,  E.,  The  Stage  in  the  Greek  Theater  according  to  the 
Extant  Dramas  (New  Haven,  1893) 

Dorpfeld,  W.,  und  Reisch,  E.,  Das  griechische  Theater 
(Athens,  1896) 

Flickinger,  R.  C.,  The  Greek  Theater  and  its  Drama,  pp.  57- 
1 1 7 ;  esp.  57-75  (2d  ed.  Chicago,  1922) 

Fowler  and  Wheeler,  Greek  Archaeology,  pp.  165-172 
Haigh,  A.  E.,  The  Attic  Theatre  (3d  ed.  Oxford,  1907) 
Norwood,  G.,  Greek  Tragedy,  pp.  49-59 
Weller,  C.  H.,  Athens  and  its  Monuments,  pp.  190-200 
Whibley,  L.,  Companion  to  Greek  Studies,  in  Chapter  on 
Religious  Institutions 
Production  of  Plays 

Allen,  J.  T.,  Greek  Acting  in  the  Fifth  Century  b.c.  (Univ. 

of  California,  Publ.  in  Class.  Phil.  Vol.  2,  No.  5) 
Flickinger,  R.  C.,  The  Greek  Theater  and  its  Drama  (2d 
ed.  Chicago,  1922) 

Gulick,  C.  B.,  Life,  pp.  112-118 

Haigh,  A.  E.,  The  Attic  Theatre  (3d  ed.  Oxford,  1907) 
Norwood,  G.,  Greek  Tragedy,  pp.  48-83 
O’Connor,  J.  B.,  Chapters  in  the  History  of  Acting  and 
Actors  in  Ancient  Greece  (Chicago,  1908) 

Rees,  K.,  So-called  Rule  of  the  Three  Actors  in  Greek 
Drama  (Chicago,  1908) 

Smith,  K.  K.,  The  Use  of  the  Buskin  (Harvard  Studies  in 
Classical  Philology,  XVI) 


CHAPTERS  XIII  AND  XIV.  TRAGEDY 

Aeschylus,  Translations  of:  see  Appendix,  Chapter  X 
Aristotle,  On  Tragic  Art:  see  Appendix,  Chapter  X 
Barnett,  L.  D.,  The  Greek  Drama  (London,  1900) 

Bryan,  W.  R.,  The  Conventions  of  the  Chorus  (U.  of  Wis.  Clas. 
Studies,  1922) 

Campbell,  L.,  A  Guide  to  Greek  Tragedy  (N.  Y.  1891) 

Capps,  E.,  The  Stage  in  the  Greek  Theater  according  to  the 
Extant  Dramas  (1893) 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  APPENDIX 


311 


Companion  to  Greek  Studies 

Decharme,  P.,  Euripides  and  the  Spirit  of  his  Dramas,  trans. 

by  Loeb  (Macmillan,  1905) 

Euripides,  Translations  of:  see  Appendix,  Chapter  X 
Flickinger,  R.  C.,  Greek  Theater  and  its  Drama  (2d  ed.  Chicago, 
1922) 

Goodell,  T.  D.,  Athenian  Tragedy,  a  Study  in  Popular  Art  (New 
Haven,  1920) 

Haigh,  A.  E.,  The  Tragic  Drama  of  the  Greeks  (Oxford,  1896) 
Jebb,  R.  C.,  see  Introductions  to  his  separate  editions  of  the 
Plays  of  Sophocles  (Cambridge,  Eng.) 

Leach,  Abby,  Fate  and  Free-will  in  Greek  Literature  (In  Cooper, 
The  Greek  Genius  and  its  Influence) 

Mackail,  J.  W.,  Lectures  on  Greek  Poetry  (Sophocles) 

Matthaei,  L.,  Studies  in  Greek  Tragedy  (Cambridge,  Eng.,  1918) 
Murray,  G.,  Euripides  and  His  Age  (N.  Y.  1913) 

-  Hamlet  and  Orestes  (Oxford,  1914) 

- in  English  Literature  and  the  Classics,  ed.  by  G.  S. 

Gordon 

Murray,  A.  T.,  Plot  and  Character  in  Greek  Tragedy  (T.  A.  P.  A. 

1916) 

Messer,  W.  S.,  The  Dream  in  Homer  and  Greek  Tragedy  (N.  Y. 

1918) 

Myers,  E.,  Aeschylus:  in  E.  Abbott’s  Hellenica 
Nestle,  W.,  Euripides,  der  Dichter  der  griechischen  Aufklarung 
(Stuttgart,  1901) 

Norwood,  G.,  Greek  Tragedy  (Boston,  1920) 

Patin,  H.,  fitudes  sur  les  tragiques  grecs  (Paris,  1885-94) 

Post,  C.  R.,  Dramatic  Art  of  Sophocles  (Harvard  Studies  in 
Classical  Philology,  23  (1912) 

Rees,  K.,  So-called  Rule  of  the  Three  Actors  in  the  Classical 
Greek  Drama  (Chicago,  1908) 

Ridgway,  W.,  The  Origin  of  Tragedy  (Cambridge,  1910) 

- The  Dramas  and  dramatic  Dances  of  non-European  Races 

in  special  Reference  to  the  Origin  of  Greek  Tragedy  (Cam¬ 
bridge,  1915) 

Sheppard,  J.  T.,  Greek  Tragedy  (Cambridge,  1920) 

Sophocles,  Translations  of:  see  Appendix  under  Chapter  X 
Stuart,  D.  C.,  Foreshadowing  and  Suspense  in  the  Euripidean 
Prologue  (Univ.  of  North  Carolina  Studies  in  Classical 
Philology,  Oct.  1918) 

-  The  Origin  of  Greek  Tragedy  in  the  Light  of  Dramatic 

Technique  {Trans,  of  the  Amer.  Phil.  Assoc.  1916,  Vol.  47) 
Van  Hook,  La  Rue,  The  “  Thought  ’’-motif  of  Wisdom  versus 
Folly  in  Greek  Tragedy  (A.  J.  P.  39,  pp.  393-401;  see,  in 
connection  with  this,  C.  Knapp,  A.  J.  P.  $ 7,  300-315) 

Weil,  H., Etudes  sur  le  drame  antique  (2d  ed.  Paris,  1908) 


312  GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 

Wheeler,  J.  R.,  Greek  Tragedy  (in  Columbia  Univ.  Lectures 
in  Greek  Literature) 

Wilson,  Pearl  C.,  Wagner’s  Dramas  and  Greek  Tragedy  (N.  Y. 
1919) 


CHAPTER  XV.  COMEDY 

Aristophanes,  Translations  of:  see  Appendix,  Chapter  X 
Capps,  E.,  Greek  Comedy,  in  Columbia  Univ.  Lectures  on 
Greek  Lit. 

-  The  Introduction  of  Comedy  into  the  City  Dionysia 

(Chicago,  1903) 

Cornford,  F.  M.,  The  Origin  of  Attic  Comedy  (London,  1914) 
Couat,  A.,  Aristophane  et  l’ancienne  comedie  attique  (Paris, 
1892) 

Denis,  J.,  La  comedie  grecque  (Paris,  1886) 

Flickinger,  R.  C.,  The  Greek  Theater  and  its  Drama  (2d  ed. 
Chicago,  1922) 

Haigh,  A.  E.,  The  Attic  Theatre  (3d  ed.  Oxford,  1907) 

Legrand,  P.  E.,  The  New  Greek  Comedy,  trans.  by  Loeb  (Put¬ 
nam,  1917) 

Menander,  Translations  of:  see  Appendix,  Chapter  X 
White,  J.  W.,  The  Verse  of  Greek  Comedy  (1912) 


CHAPTER  XVI.  PHILOSOPHY 

Adam,  J.,  The  Vitality  of  Platonism  and  other  Essays  (Cam¬ 
bridge,  1911) 

Bakewell,  C.  M.,  Source-book  in  Ancient  Philosophy  (N.  Y.  1909) 
Benn,  A.  W.,  Greek  Philosophers  (2d  ed.  London,  1914) 
Barker,  E.,  Greek  Political  Theory;  Plato  and  his  Predecessors 
(London,  1918) 

Brownson,  C.  L.,  Plato’s  Studies  and  Criticisms  of  the  Poets 
(Boston,  1920) 

Bevan,  E.  R.,  Stoics  and  Sceptics  (Oxford,  1913) 

Burnet,  J.,  Early  Greek  Philosophy  (3d  ed.  London,  1920) 

- Greek  Philosophy:  in  The  Legacy  of  Greece,  ed.  by  R.  W. 

Livingstone 

Companion  to  Greek  Studies 

Dupreel,  E.,  La  Legende  Socratique  et  les  Sources  de  Platon 
(Oxford,  1922) 

Gomperz,  T.,  Greek  Thinkers,  4  vols.  (N.  Y.  1901-05) 

Grote,  G.,  Plato  and  the  Companions  of  Socrates  (London,  1875) 
Hicks,  R.  D.,  Stoic  and  Epicurean  (N.  Y.  1910) 

Jowett,  B.,  Translation  of  Plato  and  Analyses  of  the  Platonic 
Dialogues  (3d  ed.  N.  Y.  1892) 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  APPENDIX 


313 


Leonard,  W.  E.,  Socrates,  Master  of  Life  (Chicago,  1915) 

More,  P.  E.,  Platonism  (Princeton  Univ.  Press,  1917) 

Pater,  W.  H.,  Plato  and  Platonism  (Macmillan,  1908) 

Shorey,  P.,  Plato  (in  Library  of  World’s  Best  Literature,  ed.  by 
Warner) 

Windelband,  History  of  Ancient  Philosophy  (N.  Y.  1899) 
Woodbridge,  F.,  Greek  Philosophy  (in  Columbia  Univ.  Lectures 
on  Greek  Literature) 

Zeller,  E.,  Greek  Philosophy  (Various  works) 


CHAPTER  XVII.  RELIGION 

Adam,  J.,  Religious  Teachers  of  Greece  (Edinburgh,  1908) 
Campbell,  L.,  Religion  in  Greek  Literature  (Longmans,  1898) 
Companion  to  Greek  Studies 
Cook,  A.  B.,  Zeus  (Cambridge,  Eng.,  1914) 

Cumont,  F.,  Astrology  and  Religion  among  the  Greeks  and 
Romans  (Putnam,  1912) 

Fairbanks,  A.,  Handbook  of  Greek  Religion  (N.  Y.  1908) 
Farnell,  L.  R.,  Cults  of  the  Greek  States  (5  vols.  Oxford,  1896- 
1909) 

- Higher  Aspects  of  the  Greek  Religion  (London,  1912) 

- Greek  Hero  Cults  and  Ideas  of  Immortality  (Oxford,  1921) 

- Outline-History  of  Greek  Religion  (London,  1921) 

Fox,  W.  S.,  Greek  and  Roman  Mythology  (Boston,  1916) 
Foucart,  P.,  Les  mysteres  d’Eleusis  (Paris,  1914) 

Frazer,  J.  G.,  The  Golden  Bough:  A  Study  in  Magic  and  Re¬ 
ligion  (3d  ed.  London,  1911-20) 

- Abridged  edition  of  foregoing  title  (N.  Y.  1922) 

Gardner,  E.  A.,  Religion  and  Art  in  Ancient  Greece  (N.  Y.  iqio) 
Gruppe,  O.,  Griechische  Mythologie  und  Religionsgeschichte 
(Munich,  1906) 

Gulick,  C.  B.,  Chapter  XX,  pp.  263-283 

Harrison,  J.,  Religion  of  Ancient  Greece  (London,  1913) 

-  Ancient  Art  and  Ritual  (Holt,  1913) 

-  Themis:  a  Study  of  the  Social  Origins  of  Greek  Religion 

(Cambridge  Univ.  Press,  1912) 

Hastings,  J.  H.,  Encyclopaedia  of  Religion  and  Ethics  (N.  Y. 
1908-22) 

Inge,  W.  R.,  Greek  Religion  (in  The  Legacy  of  Greece  ed.  by 
R.  W.  Livingstone) 

James,  H.  R.,  Our  Hellenic  Heritage,  vol.  I,  chapters  3  and  4 
(Gods  and  Heroes) 

Mommsen,  A.,  Feste  der  Stadt  Athen  im  Altertum  (Leipzig, 
1898) 


314  GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 

Moore,  C.  H.,  Religious  Thought  of  the  Greeks  from  Homer  to 
the  Triumph  of  Christianity  (Harvard  Univ.  Press,  1916) 

More,  P.  E.,  The  Religion  of  Plato  (Princeton  Univ.  Press,  1921) 

Murray,  G.,  Four  Stages  of  Greek  Religion  (Columbia  Univ. 

Press,  1912) 

Philios,  M.  D.,  Eleusis:  her  Mysteries,  Ruins  and  Museums 
(Appleton,  1906) 

Preller,  L.,  Griechische  Mythologie  (4th  ed.  vol.  II,  Berlin, 
1920-21) 

Rohde,  E.,  Psyche  (Tubingen,  9th  ed.  1921) 

Roscher,  W.  H.,  Lexikon  der  griechischen  und  romischen  Myth¬ 
ologie  (Leipzig) 


CHAPTER  XVIII.  SCIENCE 

Albutt,  T.  C.,  Greek  Medicine  in  Rome  (London,  1911) 
Apollonius  Pergaeus,  Treatise  on  Conic  Sections,  Heath,  T.  L. 
Cambridge,  1896) 

Archimedes,  Works,  Heath,  T.  L.  (Cambridge,  1897) 

Aristarchus  of  Samos,  See  Heath,  T.  L. 

Ball,  W.  W.  R.,  A  Short  Account  of  the  History  of  Mathematics 
(I919) 

Berger,  H.,  Geschichte  der  wissenschaftliche  Erdkunde  der 
Griechen  (2d  ed.  Leipzig,  1903) 

Berry,  A.,  Short  History  of  Astronomy  (London,  1910) 

Botsford  and  Sihler,  Hellenic  Civilization,  pp.  627-656 
B.xk,  A.  H.,  The  Growth  of  Medicine  (New  Haven,  1917) 
Bunbury,  E.  H.,  Ancient  Geography  (2  vols.  London,  1883) 
Cajori,  F.,  History  of  Mathematics  (2d  ed.  N.  Y.  1919) 
Companion  to  Greek  Studies,  ed.  by  Whibley;  chap,  on  Science. 
Dannemann,  F.,  Grundriss  einer  Geschichte  der  Naturwissen- 
schaften  (2  vols.  Leipzig,  1896-98) 

Daremberg  et  Saglio,  Dictionnaire 

Diel,  H.,  Antike  Technik  (2d  ed.  Leipzig,  1920);  for  review  of 
the  inventions  therein  described,  see  rev.  by  Humphreys  in 
Clas.  Weekly ,  Oct.  17,  1921) 

Diophantos  of  Alexandria:  A  Study  in  the  History  of  Greek 
Algebra,  Heath,  T.  L.  (2d  ed.  Cambridge,  1910) 

Elliott,  J.  S.,  Outlines  of  Greek  and  Roman  Medicine  (London, 
1914) 

Encyclopaedia  Britannica,  under  Sciences  and  Names  of  great 
Scientists  mentioned  in  the  text 

Euclid,  Elements,  trans.  with  Intro,  and  Commentary  by  Heath, 
T.  L.  (Cambridge,  1908) 

Fink,  K.,  A  Brief  History  of  Mathematics,  trans.  by  Beman, 
W.  W.,  and  Smith,  D.  E.  (3d  ed.  Chicago,  1910) 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  APPENDIX  315 

Galen,  On  the  Natural  Faculties,  Trans,  by  Brock,  A.  J.,  in 
Loeb  Library 

Garrison,  F.  H.,  History  of  Medicine  (3d  ed.  Philadelphia,  1921) 
Gomperz,  T.,  The  Greek  Thinkers  (3  vols.  N.  Y.  1901-1905) 
Gow,  J.,  Short  History  of  Greek  Mathematics  (Cambridge,  1884) 
Guenther,  S.,  Geschichte  der  Mathematik  (2  vols.  Leipzig,  1908- 
1921) 

Heath,  T.  L.,  Aristarchus  of  Samos,  the  Ancient  Copernicus 
(Oxford,  1912) 

-  History  of  Greek  Mathematics  (2  vols.  Oxford,  1921) 

-  Greek  Mathematics  and  Astronomy  in  the  Legacy  of 

Greece,  ed.  by  Livingstone,  R.  W. 

Hippocrates,  Genuine  Works,  Trans,  by  Adams,  F.  (2  vols.  N.  Y. 
1891) 

Hoppe,  E.,  Mathematik  und  Astronomie  im  klassischen  Altertum 
(Heidelberg,  1911) 

Hoefer,  F.,  Histoire  des  mathematiques  (5th  ed.  Paris,  1902) 
Josephson,  A.  G.  S.,  A  List  of  Books  on  the  History  of  Science 
(Chicago,  1911) 

Legacy  of  Greece,  ed.  by  R.  W.  Livingstone,  for  articles  on 
Medicine,  Mathematics,  Biology,  and  Natural  Science 
Lones,  T.  E.,  Aristotle’s  Researches  in  Natural  Science  (London, 

1912) 

Locy,  W.  A.,  Biology  and  its  Makers  (3d  ed.  N.  Y.  1915) 
Neuberger,  M.,  Geschichte  der  Medizin  (2  vols.  Stuttgart, 
1906-8) 

Osier,  W.,  The  Evolution  of  Modern  Medicine  (New  Haven, 

1913) 

Pauly-Wissowa,  Real-Lexikon,  under  the  names  of  the  scientists 
Puschmann,  T.,  History  of  Medical  Instruction  (London,  1891) 
Sedgwick  and  Tyler,  A  Short  History  of  Science  (N.  Y.  1917) 
Singer,  C.,  Greek  Biology  and  Medicine:  in  The  Legacy  of 
Greece,  ed.  by  R.  W.  Livingstone 
Smith,  D.  E.,  Mathematics  (Boston,  1923) 

Tannery,  P.,  Memoires  scientifiques  (Toulouse,  3  vols.  19 12-15) 

-  Recherches  sur  l’histoire  de  l’astronomie  ancienne  (Paris, 

1893) 

Theophrastus,  Enquiry  into  Plants,  trans.  by  Hort,  A.  (2  vols. 
in  Loeb  Classical  Library) 

Taylor,  H.  O.,  Greek  Biology  and  Medicine  (Boston,  1922) 
Thompson,  D.  W.,  Greek  Natural  Science:  in  The  Legacy  of 
Greece,  ed.  by  R.  W.  Livingstone 

-  Glossary  of  Greek  Birds  (Oxford,  1895) 

Tozer,  H.  F.,  History  of  Ancient  Geography  (Cambridge,  1897) 
Williams,  H.  S.,  History  of  Science  (5  vols.  Harper,  1904) 


316 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  THOUGHT 


CHAPTER  XIX.  THE  NEW  STUDY  OF  ANCIENT 

GREECE 

American  School  of  Classical  Studies  at  Athens  (see  Art  and 
Archaeology ,  American  School  Number,  Oct.,  1922) 

Baikie,  J.,  Sea-Kings  of  Crete  (London,  1910) 

Banerjee,  G.  N.,  Hellenism  in  Ancient  India  (Calcutta,  2d  ed. 

1920) 

Blegen,  C.  W.,  Korakou,  a  Prehistoric  Settlement  near  Corinth 
(1922) 

Botsford,  G.  W.,  Hellenic  History  (Especially  Chapters  II  and 
III) 

Botsford  and  Sihler,  Hellenic  Civilization 
Burrows,  R.  M.,  Discoveries  in  Crete  (N.  Y.,  1907) 

Dorpfeld,  W.,  Troja  und  Uion  (Athens,  1902) 

Dussaud,  R.,  Les  civilisations  prehelleniques  dans  le  bassin  de  la 
mer  egee  (2d  ed.  Paris,  1914) 

Evans,  A.,  The  Palace  of  Minos  at  Cnossos:  I  The  Neolithic  and 
Early  Minoan  Ages  (London,  1921) 

Gardner,  P.,  New  Chapters  in  Greek  History  (Putnam,  1892) 
Hall,  H.  R.,  The  Oldest  Civilization  in  Greece  (Lippincott,  1901) 

-  Aegean  Archaeology  (London,  1915) 

Hawes,  C.  H.  and  H.  B.,  Crete,  the  Fore-runner  of  Greece 
(Harper,  1909) 

Hogarth,  D.  G.,  The  Ancient  East  (Home  Univ.  Library) 

Lang,  A.,  World  of  Homer  (Longmans,,  1916) 

Leaf,  W.,  Troy:  a  Study  of  Homeric  Geography  (Macmillan, 
1912) 

-  Homer  and  History  (Macmillan,  1915) 

Marett,  R.  R.,  Anthropology  and  the  Classics  (1908) 

Marshall,  F.  H.,  Discoveries  in  Greek  Lands:  a  Sketch  of  the 
Principal  Excavations  and  Discoveries  of  the  last  50  years 
(Cambridge,  1920) 

Michaelis,  A.  T.  F.,  A  Century  of  Archaeological  Discoveries, 
trans.  by  B.  Kahnweiler  (London,  1908) 

Mosso,  A.,  Palaces  of  Crete  (Putnam,  1907) 

-  Dawn  of  Mediterranean  Civilization  (London,  1910) 

Poulsen,  F.,  Delphi  (London,  1920) 

Powell,  J.  V.,  and  Barber,  E.  H.,  New  Chapters  in  Greek  Litera¬ 
ture  (Oxford,  1921) 

Sandys,  J.  E.,  History  of  Classical  Scholarship  (3  vols.  1908- 

1921) 

Schuchhardt,  K.,  Schliemann’s  Excavations  (Macmillan,  1891) 
Scott,  J.  A.,  The  Unity  of  Homer  (Berkeley,  Cal.  1921) 

Seager,  R.  B.,  Explorations  in  the  Island  of  Mochlos  (1912) 
Seymour,  T.  D.,  Life  in  the  Homeric  Age  (Macmillan,  1907) 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  APPENDIX  317 

Smith,  Recovery  of  Lost  Greek  Literature  ( Yale  Review,  July, 
1914) 

Thomson,  J.  A.  K.,  The  Greek  Tradition  (Macmillan,  1915) 
Tsountas  and  Manatt,  Mycenaean  Age  (N.  Y.  1897) 

Waldstein,  C.,  Argive  Heraeum  (N.  Y.  1902) 


CHAPTER  XX.  THE  GENIUS  OF  THE  GREEKS 
Abbott,  E.,  Hellenica 

Billeter,  G.,  Die  Anschauungen  vom  Wesen  des  Griechentums 
(Teubner,  1911) 

Burns,  C.  D.,  Greek  Ideals  (London,  1917) 

Butcher,  S.  H.,  Harvard  Lectures  on  Greek  Subjects  (N.  Y. 
1904) 

-  Some  Aspects  of  the  Greek  Genius  (London,  1893) 

Chapman,  J.  J.,  Greek  Genius  and  other  Essays  (N.  Y.  1915) 
Collins,  J.  C.,  Greek  Influence  on  English  Poetry  (London,  1910) 
Cooper,  L.,  The  Greek  Genius  and  its  Influence  (Yale  Univ.  Press, 
1917) 

Croiset,  M.,  The  Greek  Race  and  its  Genius  (in  L.  Cooper’s 
Greek  Genius  and  its  Influence) 

Dickinson,  G.  L.,  The  Greek  View  of  Life  (15th  ed.  N.  Y.  1915) 
Gildersleeve,  B.  L.,  Hellas  and  Hesperia  (N.  Y.  1909) 

James,  H.  R.,  Our  Hellenic  Heritage  (vol.  I.  Macmillan,  1921) 
Livingstone,  R.  W.,  The  Greek  Genius  and  its  Meaning  to  us 
(2d  ed.  Oxford,  1915) 

- The  Legacy  of  Greece  (Oxford,  1921.  “  Essays  which  aim 

to  give  some  idea  of  what  the  world  owes  to  Greece  in 
various  realms  of  the  spirit  and  intellect,  and  of  what  it 
can  still  learn  from  her.”) 

Low,  W.  H.,  The  Debt  of  Modern  Art  to  Ancient  Greece 
(Scribners  Mag.,  May,  1920) 

Mahaffy,  J.  P.,  What  have  the  Greeks  done  for  Modern  Civiliza- 
tion?  (Putnam,  1910) 

Murray,  G.,  The  Value  of  Greece  to  the  Future  of  the  World: 

in  The  Legacy  of  Greece,  ed.  by  R.  W.  Livingstone 
- Religio  Grammatici  (N.  Y.  1918) 

Our  Debt  to  Greece  and  Rome,  edited  by  Hadzsits,  G.  D.,  and 
Robinson,  D.  M.  (Marshall  Jones  Co.,  Boston,  1922-  ) 

Shorey,  P.,  The  Assault  on  Humanism  (Boston,  1917) 

Tucker,  T.  G.,  The  Foreign  Debt  of  English  Literature 
Value  of  the  Classics,  edited  by  A.  F.  West  (Princeton  Univ. 
Press) 

Zielinski,  T.,  Our  Debt  to  Antiquity  (London,  1909). 


4 


INDEX 


abacus,  24 

Academy,  20,  158,  235 
acanthus,  26 
Acarnania,  12 

Acharnians,  of  Aristophanes,  214 

Achelous,  7 

Achilles,  10 

Achilles  Tatius,  148 

action,  in  drama,  176 

actors,  180,  181,  183;  guilds,  183 

acoustics,  in  theater,  177,  182 

Acro-Corinth,  12 

Acropolis,  22 

Admetus,  193 

admission  to  theater,  181 

Aegean  race,  8 

Aegina,  20 

Aeginetan  marbles,  50 
Aegisthus,  190 
Aeolians,  8 
Aeschines,  87,  145 
Aeschylus,  plays  of,  187-8;  as  a 
tragic  poet,  194-5;  religious 
views,  256 
Aetolia,  12 

Agamemnon,  King,  13 

Agamemnon,  of  Aeschylus,  188,  205 

Agathias,  149 

Ages  of  Man,  254 

Agias,  statue  of,  56 

agon,  212 

Agora,  21,  83 

agriculture,  97 

Agrigentum,  16 

Ajax  of  Sophocles,  174,  189; 

dramatic  value,  202 
Akragas,  16 
Alcaeus,  130 

Alcestis,  of  Euripides,  193 
Alcibiades,  39,  232 
Alcidamas,  97,  169 
Aleman,  133,  282 

Alexander  the  Great,  9;  tutored  by 
Aristotle,  244;  sarcophagus,  56 
Alexandrian  Period,  in  Literature, 
_145-8;  in  Science,  273 
algebra,  274 
Alpheus,  7,  70 
Amasis,  98 
Amazons,  in  art,  52 
amentum,  76 


American  School  at  Athens,  22, 
248;  excavations,  12,  13 
Amphictyonic  Council,  69 
Amphora,  44 

Anacreon,  133;  Anacreontics,  133 
anaesthetics,  278 
Anaxagoras,  223-4 
Anaximander,  219  ff. 

Anaximenes,  219  ff. 

Andocides,  140 
Andromache,  no 
animals,  in  art,  51 
Antenor,  49 
Anthologies,  149-51 
Anthropomorphism,  221,  253;  in 
art,  62 

Antigone,  of  Sophocles,  189 
Antioch,  119 
Antiochus  Epiphanes,  29 
Antiphon,  140 
Antisthenes,  248 
antitheses,  221 
Anytus,  230 
Apelles,  3 
Aphaia,  temple,  50 
Aphrodite,  of  Melos,  59  f.;  of 
Cnidus,  55;  265 

Apollo,  oracle  of,  12;  early  statues 
of,  49 ;  statue  at  Olympia,  50 ; 
Belvedere,  59;  and  Marsyas,  55; 
at  Athens,  264;  Hymn  to,  72 
Apollonius,  147,  274 
Apology,  of  Plato,  230,  234,  236 
Apoxyomenus,  56 
Appian,  148 
Aratus,  148,  275 
Arcadia,  14 
Arcesilas,  60 

Archaic  Period  of  Art,  49  f. 

archaism,  in  art,  61 

Archilochus,  I2g 

Archimedes,  273 

architecture,  23-34 

architrave,  24 

Archons,  85;  179 

Areopagus,  22;  Council  of,  85 

Aretaeus,  279 

Arete,  no 

Argolis,  13 

Argos,  13 

Arion,  134,  185 


319 


320 


INDEX 


Aristarchus,  146,  275 
Aristion  stele,  49 
Aristippus,  248 
Aristocles,  49 

Aristophanes,  213-15;  Clouds,  88; 
Criticism  of  Eur.,  198-9;  on 
education,  156  ff . ;  political  atti¬ 
tude,  100;  Knights,  99,  100 
Aristophanes  of  Byzantium,  116, 
146 

Aristotle,  244-7;  works,  244  ff.; 
Rhetoric  and  Poetic,  246;  on  the 
Unities,  247;  on  Oed.  Tyr.,  247; 
ideal  state,  91;  on  slavery,  104; 
on  origin  of  tragedy,  185;  on 
tragedy,  207,  21 1;  as  scientist, 
276 

Arnold,  M.,  Empedocles  on  Aetna, 
223;  Merope,  200;  on  Sophocles, 
196;  on  Homer,  293 
Arrian,  148 

Artemis,  265;  of  Versailles,  59 

Artemisium,  56 

aryballus,  45 

asceticism,  249 

Asclepius,  13,  265-7 

Ascra,  n 

Asiatic  School  of  Oratory,  163 
Aspasia,  hi 

Assembly,  83  f. ;  composition  of,  86 
Astronomy,  275  f. 

Ate,  in  Aeschylus,  195 
Athena,  Lemnian,  52 ;  Promachus, 
33;  of  Phidias,  34;  worship  of, 
263  f. 

Athenaeus,  148 

athletics,  63-78;  and  art  62,  64; 

in  Homer,  63 ;  girls  in,  74 
Atomists,  224;  Atomic  Theory  and 
Epicurus,  250 
Atossa,  187 

Attic  Period  of  Literature,  137-45 
Attica,  17-22 

Attic-Ionic  style  in  Architecture,  26 
aula,  38 
Aulis,  13 

Bacchylides,  135;  rival  of  Pindar, 
73 

Bacon,  238 
ball-playing,  63 
banks,  41 

barbarians,  240,  290 
Batrachomyomachia,  283 
beds,  40 
Bellamy,  238 
Bion,  146 

Birds,  of  Aristophanes,  214 
black-figured  vases,  43 
Blomfield,  R.,  23 


Boeotia,  n;  Boeotian,  as  reproach, 
11 

Boethus,  59 
books,  see  Chap.  IX 
booksellers,  118 
Boston  Museum,  47 
boxing,  76 

British  excavations  at  Mycenae,  13 
at  Sparta,  15 
British  Museum,  34 
bronze,  statues,  48 
Bronze  Age,  8 
bronteion,  175 
Browning,  E.  B.,  188 
Brygus,  98 
burglars,  38 
Burnet,  J.,  217 
Butcher,  S.  H.,  1 
Byron,  on  Sunium,  19 

Cadmea,  11;  Cadmus,  11 
Callicrates,  34 

Callimachus,  147 ;  on  “  big  books,” 
115 

Callinus,  127 
cantharus,  44 

Capps,  E.,  on  Icaria,  172;  on  stage, 
176;  on  Menander,  216 
Caryatides,  33 
Cassius  Dio,  148 
Castalian  Spring,  12 
caste,  in  Plato  and  Aristotle,  91 
cathedra,  154 

Catullus,  Ode  to  Brother,  126;  on 
Simonides,  135 
cella,  25,  27 
cellars,  39 

Celsus,  physician,  278 

censorship  of  poetry,  156,  242 

census,  79 

Centaurs,  50,  63 

Cephalas,  149 

Cephalus,  101 

Cephisodotus,  54 

Cephisus,  17,  20 

Ceramicus,  cemetery,  21,  43 

Chaeronea,  9,  11 

chairs,  40 

Chapman’s  Homer,  285 
Charmides,  of  Plato,  236 
Charon’s  Steps,  175 
Charioteer,  of  Delphi,  51 
chemistry,  272 
chests,  40 
Chilon,  219 
Chios,  sculpture,  49 
Choerilus,  186 
choral  poetry,  130 
choregia,  90;  expenses  of,  180 
choregus,  180 


INDEX 


321 


Chorus,  value  and  function  of,  204- 
6;  in  Comedy,  212;  in  New 
Comedy,  215;  number  of,  184 
Christianity,  Greek  element  in,  263, 
270;  and  Orphism,  259 
chryselephantine  statues,  34,  48 
Chrysippus,  249 
Cicero,  134;  de  Republica,  238 
Cimon,  28,  98 
cisterns,  39 

citadel,  of  Athens,  32  ff. 

Cithaeron,  11,  17 

citizenship,  103 

citizens  of  Athens,  82-101 

City  Dionysia,  179 

Cladeus,  70 

Cleanthes,  249 

Cleon,  87,  100 

climate  of  Greece,  7 

Clisthenes,  81 

Clitias,  44,  98 

Clouds  of  Aristophanes,  214;  as  at¬ 
tack  on  Socrates,  233-4 
Clytaemnestra,  189,  190 
Cnidians,  treasury  of,  50 
Cnossos,  281 
cobblers,  99 
coins,  4,  264 
colonies,  80 
Colonus,  20 
color,  26 
Comedy,  212-16 
comic  element  in  art,  62 
commonplaces,  teaching  of,  162 
communism,  in  Plato,  241 
commus,  184 

competition  in  athletics,  65 
comus,  212 

Conklin,  Professor,  on  Greeks,  288 
contribution  of  Greek  States,  6-16 
Corax,  140 

Corinth,  12;  capture  of,  9 
Corinthian  order,  26;  vases,  43 
cornice,  24 
coryphaeus,  205 
Cos,  medicine  of,  276 
costume,  in  drama,  181-3 
cothurnus,  182 

Council  of  Five  Hundred,  84 
Cowjey,  133 
crater,  44 

Crlatylus,  of  Plato,  236 
Crete,  8 
Critius,  51 
Crito,  of  Plato,  236 
Croiset,  100 
Cronos,  254 
Croton,  220 


Cyclic  Poems,  124 

Cyclops,  of  Euripides,  186 

Cyllene,  7 

cylix,  44 

Cynics,  248 

Cynosarges,  248 

Cypria,  124 

Cyprus,  48 

Cyrenaics,  248 

Cyrene,  248 

Cyrnus,  128 

Cyrus,  the  Younger,  13 
Cythera,  57 

Daimonion  of  Socrates,  232 
Danae  and  Perseus,  of  Simonides, 
135 

Dante,  on  Aristotle,  244 
Daphnis,  death  of,  146 
death-rate,  80 
Deianira,  191,  203 
Delian  Confederacy,  28 
Delos,  houses  at,  39 
Delphi,  12;  charioteer  of,  51 
demagogues,  87 

Demeter,  worship  of,  260  ff.;  Hymn 
to,  125,  260;  of  Cnidus,  54 
Demetrius  of  Phalerum,  119 
Demetrius  Poliorcetes,  58 
Democritus,  224;  influence  on  Epi¬ 
curus,  250 

Demosthenes,  142-145;  on  luxury, 
39;  Philippics  and  Olynthiacs,  9; 
portrait-statue,  59 
dentils,  26 

deus  ex  machina,  174-5;  in  Philoc- 
tetes,  192 

Dexileus,  grave-relief,  57 

Diadumenus,  52 

dialectic,  228;  of  Plato,  235 

dicasts,  86 

Dicaeopolis,  100 

Dickins,  G.,  46,  59 

didascalus,  180 

Dinarchus,  orator,  145 

Dio  Chrysostom,  on  Menander,  216 

Diodorus  Siculus,  148 

Diogenes  Laertius,  231,  250 

Diogenes  of  Sinope,  249 

Dionysia,  179 

Dionysius  of  Halicarnassus,  148 
Dionysus,  at  Athens,  264;  Hymn 
to,  30,  125;  theater  at  Athens, 
177-8 

Diophantus,  274 
Dioscorides,  279 
dipteral,  29 
diptych,  1 14 


322  INDEX 


Dipylum,  21 
Discobolus,  51,  7S 
discus-throw,  75 
dithyramb,  185 
dokimasia,  84 
Dorians,  8 
Doric  Order,  24-5 
Dorpfeld,  280 
Doryphorus,  52,  76 
Douris,  44 
drachma,  73 
dromos,  71 
Dying  Gaul,  59 

eccyclema,  175 
echinus,  24 

economic  conditions,  Chap.  VIII 
Education,  152-171 
egg-and-dart,  26 

Egypt,  and  Greek  papyri,  115,  282 
Eleatics,  221 

election,  method  of,  see  Chap.  VIII 
Electra,  of  Sophocles,  190 
Elegy,  126 

Eleusinian  Mysteries,  260  ff . ;  pro¬ 
faned,  141 
Eleusis,  20 
Eleutherae,  51 
Elgin,  Lord,  35-6;  52 
Elis,  14 

emotion  in  art,  54,  59 
Empedocles,  222-3 
Empire,  Athenian,  31,  289 
Encomium  on  Helen,  of  Gorgias, 
164 

English  literature  and  Greek  pas¬ 
toral,  146 
Enneacrunus,  27 
entablature,  24 
entasis,  24 
Epaminondas,  11 
Ephebes,  170-1 
Ephesus,  sculpture  of,  58 
Ephialtes,  85 
Ephorus,  167 
Epicharmus,  212 
Epic  poetry,  123  ff. 

Epictetus,  249 

Epicureans,  and  Epicurus,  250-1; 
225 

Epidaurus,  13;  cult  at,  266;  theater 
at,  177 

Epideictic  discourse,  163 
Epinicia,  136 

Eponymus,  archon,  85,  179 
Epithalamia,  13 1 
Erasistratus,  278 
Eratosthenes,  scientist,  275 
Erechtheum,  33 


Ergotimus,  98 
Erinyes,  257 
Eristics,  227 
Erymanthus,  7 
Ethics,  of  Aristotle,  245 
Etruria,  43 
Euclid,  273 

Eudemus,  geometer,  273;  Eudemian 
Ethics,  245 
Eudoxus,  275 
eugenics,  Plato  on,  242 
Eumenides,  of  Aeschylus,  174,  189 
Eumolpus,  261 
Euphronius,  44,  99 
Euphuism,  163 

Euripides,  plays  of,  193-4;  as  a 
tragic  poet,  197-9;  on  athletics, 
66;  religious  views,  257-8 
Eurotas,  15 
Eurydice,  190 
Eutherus,  93 

Euthydemus,  118;  of  Plato,  236 
Euthydicus,  49 
Euthyphro,  of  Plato,  236 
Evolution,  220 

excavations,  Greek,  2;  280  ff.;  at 
Argos,  13 ;  at  Eleusis,  20,  262 ; 
at  Epidaurus,  266;  at  Delphi,  12; 
at  Corinth,  12;  at  Olympia,  14, 
50,  69 

Farnese  Heracles,  61;  -  Bull,  61 

fasciae,  26 

Fate,  in  Aeschylus,  195;  in  Greek 
drama,  209-10 
Ferguson,  W.  S.,  96 
Festival-Games,  68-75;  festivals  of 
Dionysus,  179 
fillet,  52 

Financial  Officers,  86 
foot-races,  76 
foreigners,  101-4 

frieze,  24,  47;  of  Parthenon,  35,  53 
Frogs,  of  Aristophanes,  156,  183, 
214 

Furies,  189 
furniture,  40 

gable,  26 
Galen,  148,  279 
Gardiner,  E.  N.,  75 
Generals,  85 

Genius  of  the  Greeks,  287-295 

genre,  in  art,  62 

geography,  225 

Geometric  vases,  42 

ghost,  in  Persians  of  Aeschylus,  175 

Gildersleeve,  73 


INDEX 


girls,  in  athletics,  74;  education  of, 
iS4 

glass,  41 

Glauce,  fountain,  12 

gnomic  elegy,  128 

gods,  their  functions  and  worship, 

254  ff. 

golden  mean,  245,  256,  292 
Gorgias,  at  Olympia,  71;  162-7;  of 
Plato,  236 
Gothic  art,  36,  46 
Graeco-Roman  Period,  in  sculpture, 
60  ff. ;  in  Literature,  148-51. 
grammatistes,  154 

grave-reliefs,  from  Thessaly,  11; 
sculptured,  57 

Greece,  Chap.  II;  modern  Greece,  4 
Greek,  modern,  4 
guardians,  in  Plato,  241 
guttae,  25 

gymnasia,  in  Athens,  68 
gymnasiarchia,  90 
gymnastic,  154 

Hadrian,  29 
Haemon,  190 

Harmodius  and  Aristogiton,  51 
Harpy  Tomb,  50 
Hawthorne,  Marble  Faun,  55 
Heath,  T.  L.,  on  Greek  Science,  279 
heating  of  houses,  39 
Hebraic  element  in  Aeschylus’  plays, 
194 

Hebrews,  217 
Hedonists,  248,  250 
hegemony  of  Greece,  11,  14,  69 
Hegeso,  grave-relief,  57 
Hekatompedos,  34 
Helen,  of  Gorgias,  translation  of, 
164-7 
heliasts,  86 
Helicon,  Mt.,  11 
Heliodorus,  148 
Hellanodicae,  71 
Hellenistic  Sculpture,  57  ff. 
Hephaesteum,  28 

Hephaestus,  patron  of  artisans,  98 
Heracles,  labors,  7,  50 ;  founds 

Games,  69;  bow  of,  192;  in  Al- 
cestis,  193 
Heraclitus,  222 
Heraea,  games,  74 

Heraeum,  at  Argos,  13 ;  at  Olympia, 
54 

Hermes,  of  Praxiteles,  49,  54  f. ; 
Hymn  to,  125;  worship  of,  254, 
265 ;  Hermae,  265 
Hero(n),  275 
Herodes  Atticus,  18 


323 

Herodotus,  10;  at  Olympia,  71; 

History  of,  137 
Heroes,  Age  of,  255 
Herophilus,  278 

Hesiod,  11;  works  of,  124;  and 
Religion,  254-5 
hetairae,  111 
hexastyle,  28 
Hieron,  16 
Hipparchus,  276 
Hippias  of  Elis,  162 
Hippoclides,  137 

Hippocrates,  277;  School,  Corpus, 
and  Oath,  277 
Hippodamia,  75 
Hippodamus,  102 
Hippodrome,  69 
Hippolytus,  203 
History,  Writing  of,  137 
hockey,  78 

Homer,  Iliad,  23,  64;  Odyssey,  6, 
63;  oratory  in,  140;  poems  on 
papyrus,  115;  unity  of,  124; 
banishment  Ly  Plato,  242;  and 
Religion,  253 ;  and  scholarship, 
123,  284 

Homeric  Hymns,  125 
homicide,  85 
honey,  of  Hymettus,  19 
Horace,  on  Rome  captured  by 
Greece,  9;  on  marble  of  Hymet¬ 
tus,  19;  as  a  warrior,  129;  on 
Alcaeus,  130;  on  Ship  of  State, 
130;  inspired  by  Alcaeus,  13 1; 
Sapphic  stanza  in,  13 1 ;  on  Simo¬ 
nides,  135;  on  Pindar,  136;  on 
Pythagoreans,  220;  on  Epicureans, 

251 

houses,  37-40;  cost  and  rent  of,  38; 

simplicity  of,  87 
hybris,  in  Aeschylus,  195 
hydria,  44 

Hymettus,  19;  colors  of,  19;  beeg 
and  honey,  19 
Hyperides,  145,  167 


Iacchus,  261 

Iambic  Poetry,  129;  trimeter,  186 

Ictinus,  34 

Idealism,  in  art,  62 

Ideas,  TTieory  of,  in  Plato,  243-4 

Ilissus,  river,  17 

immortality,  Chap.  XVII 

Inge,  W.  R.,  on  Religion,  252 

ink,  116 

inscriptions,  3 

internationalism,  239,  289  f. 

Iole,  192 


324 


INDEX 


Ion  of  Chios,  207 
Ionia,  contribution  of,  15 
Ionians,  8 
Ionic  order,  26 

Ionic  School  of  Philosophy,  219 
Iphigenia  among  the  Taurians  ,193- 
4 

Iron  Age,  8 

irony,  Socratic,  230;  tragic,  196 
Isaeus,  142,  167 
Ischomachus,  109 
Islands  of  the  Blest,  254 
Isocrates,  orator,  141-2 ;  as  educa¬ 
tor,  167-9;  on  athletics,  67;  on 
Games,  70 

Isthmus  of  Corinth,  12,  17 

Jackson,  H.,  on  Socratic  wisdom, 
229 

Jason,  in  the  Argonautica,  147;  in 
the  Medea,  193 
javelin-throw,  75 
Jocasta,  190 
Josephus,  148 

Jowett,  on  Plato,  158  and  Chap. 
XVI 

jumping,  75 
juries,  86 

klismos,  40,  37 
Knights,  87,  214 

labor,  see  Chap.  VIII,  esp.  97 
Laches,  of  Plato,  236 
lamps,  41 
Laius,  190  f. 

Laocoon  group,  61 
Lapiths,  50,  53 

Latin  Literature,  influenced  by 
Greek,  291 

Laurium,  silver  mines,  19;  slave 
miners  at,  105 
law-courts,  86 
Laws,  of  Plato,  236 
lawyers,  97 
lecythus,  44 
Lemnian  Athena,  52 
Lenaea,  179 
Lesbos,  poets  of,  130 
Lessing,  Laocoon ,  61 
Leucippus,  224 
Leuctra,  battle  of,  11 
Libation-Bearers  of  Aeschylus,  189 
librarians,  at  Alexandria,  119 
library,  at  Pergamum,  1 1 7 ;  private, 
.  1 18;  public,  1 18 
limestone,  23;  statues  of,  49 


Lincoln,  A.,  Memorial  to,  46; 

Gettysburg  address,  96 
lighting,  of  temples,  27;  of  houses, 
39 

Lions’  Gate,  Mycenae,  13 
Literature,  Greek,  see  Chap.  X;  in¬ 
fluence  on  later  literatures,  291 ; 
recovery  of,  282  f. 
liturgies,  89  f.,  180 
Livingstone,  R.  W.,  on  Greek 
Genius,  280 
logographos,  140,  167 
Long  Walls,  20 
Longinus,  148,  194 
Longus,  148 

losses  of  Greek  Literature,  119 
love,  romantic,  no;  in  Tragedy, 
203;  in  New  Comedy,  215 
Lucan,  249 
Lucian,  148 

Lucretius,  on  Empedocles,  223;  on 
Atomic  Theory,  225;  on  Epi¬ 
curus,  250 
Lycabettus,  Mt.,  21 
Lycon,  230 

Lycurgus,  29,  68,  145,  167,  177 
Lyric  Poetry,  126-136 
lyrics,  in  drama,  183 
Lysias,  141;  at  Olympia,  71; 
Mantitheus,  87;  on  the  choregia, 
90;  On  the  Cripple,  99 
Lysicrates,  Monument,  26,  30 
Lysippus*  SSL 
Lysis,  of  Plato,  236 
Lysistrata,  214 

Macedonia,  9 

magistrates,  85 

Magna  Graecia,  15 

Mantinea,  battle  of,  11,  138 

Marathon,  plain,  18;  battle,  19; 

burial-mound,  19;  heroes,  157 
marble,  Pentelic,  18;  various  mar¬ 
bles,  23,  48 

Marcus  Aurelius,  148;  and  Greek 
Philosophy,  251 
Margites,  283 

marriage,  of  Athenian  women,  108  ff. 
Mars’  Hill,  22 
mask,  in  drama,  182 
Mathematics,  273  ff. 

Mausoleum,  54 

Medea,  of  Euripides,  193,  198 
Medicine,  276-9 
Mediterranean  race,  8 
Meleager,  149 
Meletus,  230 
Melic  verse,  130 


INDEX 


325 


Melissus,  the  Eleatic,  222 
Menander,  215 
Meno,  of  Plato,  236 
Mesogaea,  17 
Messenia,  14 
metempsychosis,  220 
metics,  101-4 

metope,  24;  of  Parthenon,  52 
Metropolitan  Museum,  N.  Y.,  30, 

47,  56,  $8 
Miltiades,  19 
Milton,  244 

Mimes,  of  Theocritus,  147;  of 
Herondas,  148 
Mimnermus,  127 
mina,  38 

Minoan,  13,  281 ;  Minos,  2 
mirrors,  41 
Mnesicles,  32 

modern  Greece,  4;  modern  Greek, 
120 

Moira,  in  Aeschylus,  195 

money,  purchasing  power  of,  38 

monodic  poetry,  130 

Moore,  C.  H.,  on  Greek  Religion, 

253;  -  Thomas,  133 

More,  Utopia,  238 
mortar,  23 
moschophorus,  49 
Moschus,  146 

mountains,  of  Greece,  6  f. 
Mummius,  9,  12 
Miinchhausen,  148 
Murray,  G.,  118;  on  origin  of 
tragedy,  185 
Musaeus,  157 
Muses,  of  Helicon,  n 
museums,  3 

music,  Greek,  72,  154,  157;  competi¬ 
tions  in,  73 ;  in  theater,  183-4 
Mycenae,  13,  281 ;  Mycenaean  Age, 
13 ;  vases,  42 
Myrina,  48 
mysticism,  258 
Myron,  51,  75 

Nausicaa,  63,  no 

Nemesis,  in  Herodotus,  137;  in 
Aeschylus,  195 
Neoptolemus,  192 

Nero,  Athenian  theater  in  time  of, 
178 

Nesiotes,  51 

Nessus,  the  Centaur,  192 
New  Comedy,  215 
Nicosthenes,  44 
Nike  Apteros,  temple,  32 
Niobe  group,  59 


Nostoi,  124 
Novel,  Greek,  148 

Odyssey,  123 
Oedipodeia,  124 

Oedipus,  11 ;  as  hero,  209;  at  Co- 
lonus,  20;  Oed.  at  Colonus,  192; 
Oed.  Tyr.,  190-1 ;  dramatic  value 
of  Oed.  Tyr.,  203;  Aristotle  on, 
247 

oenochoe,  44 
Oenomaus,  50 
Old  Comedy,  212-15 
olive,  17 

Olympia,  14 ;  excavations  at,  69  f . 
Olympian  Games,  69-71 ;  revived, 

30,  68 

Olympieum,  29 

Olympus,  Mt.,  7 

Opisthodomos,  35 

Oratory  and  Rhetoric,  139-145 

orchestra,  173,  177,  178 

orders  of  architecture,  24 

Oresteia,  188-9;  256 

Orestes,  189,  190;  as  a  character, 

209;  -  and  Electra  group,  61 

Organon,  244 

Orient,  and  Greek  Religion,  263 

Oriental  influences,  43 

origin  of  the  Greeks,  8 

orphans,  89;  state  education  of,  153 

Orpheus,  157,  258 

Orphism,  258 

Osier,  Sir  Wm.,  on  Greeks,  294  f. 
Ossa,  Mt.,  10 
ostracism,  84,  114 
Ovid,  praise  of  Hymettus,  19 

paedagogus,  154 
Paeonius,  Victory  of,  50 
Paestum,  15 
Painted  Porch,  249 
painting,  3 
Palaestra,  67,  76 
Palatine  Anthology,  149 
Palinode,  of  Stesichorus,  134 
Pamphaeus,  98 
Panaetius,  249 

Panathenaea,  73;  Panathenaic  am¬ 
phorae,  74 
Pandora,  254 
pankration,  77 
Pantheism,  221,  258 
paper,  117 
Pappus,  274 
papyrus,  115 
parabasis,  212-3 


326 


INDEX 


parascenia,  1 74 
parchment,  117 
Parmenides,  222 
Parnassus,  7,  12 
Parnes,  17 

parodus,  173;  entrance-song,  212 
Partheneia,  134 

Parthenon,  34-6;  frieze,  53;  a 
mosque,  35 
Pasion,  102 
Pastoral  Poetry,  146 
patina ,  18 

Patroclus,  funeral-games,  64 
Paul,  Saint,  22 

Pausanias,  18,  33,  35,  50,  54,  74; 

on  the  Mysteries,  260 
Pasiteles,  60 

pay,  of  council-members,  84,  96;  of 
jurymen,  86,  96;  of  Sophists,  162, 
168;  of  playwrights,  181 
Peace,  statue  of,  54 ;  of  Aris¬ 
tophanes,  214 
pediment,  26 
Pella,  9 

Peloponnesus,  12;  Pel.  War,  14,  80 
Pelops,  50 
Penelope,  no 
Peneus,  7,  10 
pentathlon,  75 
Pentelicus,  18 
peplos,  of  Athena,  35 
Pergamum,  in  sculpture,  58 ;  as 
book-market,  117 
periacti,  175 

Pericles,  as  General,  85;  on  women, 
in;  Funeral  Oration ,  82,  138 
Peripatetics,  244 
peripety,  205 
peripteral,  28 
peristyle,  28 

Persians,  of  Aeschylus,  11,  187,  204 
Persius,  249 
Phaedo,  of  Plato,  236 
Phaedrus,  theater  of,  178;  of  Plato, 
236 

Phalerum,  19 
Phaon  and  Sappho,  131 
Phayllus,  75 
Pherenice,  74 

Phidias,  33,  34;  friend  of  Pericles, 
98;  statue  of  Zeus,  52;  Lem- 
nian  Athena,  52;  and  Parthenon 
sculptures,  53 
Philip  of  Macedon,  9 
Philoctetes,  of  Sophocles,  192 
philosophos,  meaning  of,  218 
Philosophy,  217-251;  schools  of, 
169 


Phocis,  12 
Phormion,  102 
Phrynichus,  186,  204 
Phyle,  103 
physicians,  98 
Physicists,  222-5 
pinaces,  174 
Pinacotheca,  33 

Pindar,  10,  11,  136;  on  chariot- 
races  and  Games,  72  f . ;  lost 
works,  120;  religious  views,  255-6 
Piraeus,  19 
Pirene,  12 
Pirithoous,  50 
Pisistratus,  27,  29 
pithus,  44 
Pittacus,  159,  219 
plagiarism,  283 
plague,  at  Athens,  80,  138 
Planudean  Anthology,  149 
Plataea,  battle,  1 1 
Plato,  233-244;  his  writings,  235; 
epigrams,  149;  on  slavery,  104; 
on  education,  158-9;  indebted¬ 
ness  to  Socrates,  235;  ideal  state, 
237  ff. ;  communism,  241;  com¬ 
munity  of  wives  and  children, 
241 ;  eugenics,  242 ;  attitude  to¬ 
ward  poets,  242 ;  Theory  of  Ideas, 
243-4;  religious  views,  268;  ad¬ 
mirer  of  Sparta,  81 
Plautus,  and  New  Comedy,  215 
Pliny,  on  art,  60 
plots,  in  drama,  196,  206  ff. 
Plutarch,  148;  Life  of  Pericles,  31, 
36;  on  Menander,  216 
Pnyx,  22,  83 

Poetics,  of  Aristotle,  246-7 
Politics,  of  Aristotle,  245-6 
Polity  of  the  Athenians,  89 
Polybius,  148 
Polybus,  191 
polychromy,  27,  48 
Polyclitus,  51 
Polycrates,  137 
Polydeuces,  76 

Polygnotus,  3,  249;  made  citizen, 
98 

polytheism,  in  art,  61 
Pope,  Iliad,  285 
population,  of  Athens,  79  ff. 

Porch  of  the  Maidens  (Caryatids), 
33 

portraiture,  in  art,  3,  58 
Poseidon,  10,  33 ;  Sunium,  temple 
of,  19 ;  at  Athens,  263  f. 

Post- Aristotelians,  247-51 
Potters’  Quarter,  21 


INDEX 


327 


Pottier,  98 
Poulsen,  72 
Pratinas,  186 
Praxiteles,  54 
Pre-Socratics,  218-225 
Priene,  house  at,  39 
Prodicus  of  Ceos,  162 
production  of  plays,  179-184 
proedria,  65 

professionalism,  in  athletics,  65 
professors,  97 

prologues,  of  Euripides,  199 
Prometheus  Bound,  of  Aeschylus, 
188;  dramatic  value  of,  202, 
208 

pronaos,  34 
Propylaea,  32 
proscenium,  1 74 
Protagoras,  162 ;  of  Plato,  236 
prytany,  83 ;  prytanes,  84 ;  Pry- 
taneum,  66 

Ptolemy,  astronomer,  276 
punctuation,  116 

Puttenham,  Arte  of  Eng.  Poesie,  126 
Pyrrho,  the  Sceptic,  251 
Pythagoras  and  Pythagoreans,  220- 
1;  and  Orphism,  259;  as  a 
mathematician,  272 
Pythian  Games,  71 

races,  athletic,  see  Chap.  VII 
Rationalism,  in  Euripides,  257 
reading  public,  117;  reading  aloud, 
i5S 

Realism,  Greek,  293;  in  Greek  art, 
58,  62 

recovery  of  lost  literature,  121 
red-figured  vases,  43 
regula,  2  5 

reincarnation,  223,  258 
Religion,  252-270;  in  Homer,  253; 
in  Hesiod,  254-5;  in  Pindar,  255; 
in  Aeschylus,  and  Sophocles,  256; 
in  Euripides,  257;  in  Plato,  268; 
scepticism  in,  267  f. 

Republic  of  Plato,  237  ff. 
rent  of  houses,  38 
reversal  of  fortune,  205 
rhapsodes,  117,  124 
Rhetoric,  159  ff.;  and  Oratory,  139- 
145;  of  Aristotle,  246 
Rhetors,  84 

Rhodes,  sculpture  of,  58,  61 
rhytum,  45 

Ribot,  M.,  on  Greek  Genius,  287 
Ridgeway,  W.,  on  origin  of  tragedy, 

185 

rivers  of  Greece,  7 


Rodd,  Rennel,  poem,  6 
Romans,  carry  off  Greek  art,  12, 
60;  elegists,  127;  and  Greek  Lit¬ 
erature,  291 
Roosevelt,  T.,  290 
Rufus,  279 
rugs,  41 

Rural  Dionysia,  179 
Ruskin,  65 

Sacred  Way,  20,  21 
Salamis,  20 
Sappho,  131-3 
Satyr,  of  Praxiteles,  55 
Satyr-drama,  186;  satyr-play,  180 
scene-buildings,  173 
scenery,  in  theater,  174-5;  of 
Greece,  7 

scepticism,  religious,  267  f. 

Sceptics,  251 
Schliemann,  13,  280 
scholarship,  119 
Science,  Greek,  271-9 
Scopas,  54 
Sculpture,  46-62 
sea,  influence  of,  7 
Selinus,  50 

Senate,  or  Council,  84 
Seneca,  197,  210 

Seven  against  Thebes,  of  Aeschylus, 
156,  187 

Seven  Wise  Men,  159,  219 
Shakespeare,  200,  204,  207 
Shelley,  Prometheus ,  125,  188,  200, 
286 

Shield  of  Heracles,  124 
Shorey,  Paul,  on  Greek  Literature, 
122;  transl.  of  Archilochus,  129; 
on  Plato’s  prose,  236;  on  the  Re¬ 
public,  237-8 

Sicilian  Expedition,  80;  in  Thucy¬ 
dides,  138 

Sicilian  Rhetoric,  140 
Sicily,  2,  15 
Sicyon,  sculpture,  55 
Sidon,  sarcophagi,  56 
Simonides  of  Ceos,  10,  73,  134 
skins,  for  writing,  117 
slaves,  104-7 
Smyth,  H.  W.,  72 
social  conditions,  Chap.  VIII 
society,  in  Athens,  Chap.  VIII,  esp. 
100  f. 

Socrates,  227-234;  on  athletics,  66; 

on  Sophists,  161 ;  on  work,  93 
soil,  of  Greece,  7 
Solon,  81,  159;  as  poet,  128,  219 
Sophists,  159  ff.;  226-7 


328 


INDEX 


Sophocles,  plays  of,  189-192;  as  a 
tragic  poet,  195-7;  religious 
views,  256 

sophrosyne,  270;  in  Sophocles,  195 
Soranus,  279 

sources  of  information,  1-5 
Sparta,  14;  education  at,  152;  aris¬ 
tocratic,  81 
Spercheus,  7 
Speusippus,  169 
Sphacteria,  51 
Sphinx,  190 

Stadium,  at  Athens,  29,  68 

stage  (?)  in  Greek  theater,  175  ff. 

stamnus,  44 

stasima,  184 

stele,  of  Aristion,  49 

Stesichorus,  134 

Stobaeus,  148 

Stoics,  249-250;  at  Rome,  249 
Strabo,  148 
street  of  tripods,  30 
Strepsiades,  87 

Stuart,  D.  C.,  on  Euripides’  pro¬ 
logues,  199 

substantive  sculpture,  47 
Sulla,  29 

Sunium  promontory,  17 
Suppliant  Women,  of  Aeschylus, 
174,  184,  187,  205 
Swift,  148 

Swinburne,  Atalanta  in  Calydon, 
200;  on  Greek  gifts,  292 
sycophants,  87 
Symposium,  of  Plato,  236 

tables,  40 

tablets,  writing,  114 
Tanagra  figurines,  n,  48 
Tarentum,  448 

taxation,  90;  of  foreigners,  103 
Taygetus,  Mt.,  7,  15 
teachers,  98,  154 
Tempe,  Vale  of,  10 
temples,  24 ;  used  as  Christian 
churches,  28,  35 
Tennyson,  10 

Terence,  and  New  Comedy,  215 
Terpander,  130 
terra-cotta  statues,  48 
tetralogies,  180 

Thales,  219  ff. ;  as  mathematician,  272 
Thargelia,  153 

theater,  172-184;  at  Eretria,  175; 
at  Epidaurus  and  Megalopolis, 
177;  at  Athens,  22,  177-8; 

acoustics  in,  177;  expense  of  pro¬ 
ducing  plays,  90 


theatron,  172 

Thebes,  1 1 ;  aristocratic,  81 
Themistocles,  19,  20 
Theocritus,  146-7 
Theognis,  128 
Theogony,  of  Hesiod,  124 
Theophrastus,  botanist,  276 
Theopompus,  167 
Theoric  Fund,  181 
Thermopylae,  poems  on,  134 
Theseus,  18;  statue  of,  52 
Theron,  tyrant,  16 
Theseum,  28 
Thesmothetae,  85 
Thespis,  185 
Thessalian  Greeks,  10 
Thessaly,  10 

Thirty  Tyrants,  93,  141 ;  and  Soc¬ 
rates,  233 

Tholos,  at  Athens,  84 ;  at  Epi¬ 
daurus,  266 
Thrasybulus,  233 
thronos,  40 
Thucydides,  138 
Timaeus,  of  Plato,  236 
Timotheus,  282 
Tiresias,  190 
Tiryns,  13 
Tisias,  140 
tombstones,  57 
torches,  41 ;  torch-races,  76 
torus,  26 

Trachiniae,  of  Sophocles,  191 
Trackers,  of  Sophocles,  186 
Tragedy,  185-211;  literary  quality, 
200;  dramatic  value,  200  ff.;  love 
element  in,  203;  plots  of,  204; 
chorus  in,  204-6;  as  spectacle, 
206;  Fate  in,  209-10;  relation  to 
modern,  210;  defined,  246 
Tralles,  sculpture  of,  58,  61 
Treasury  of  Athenians,  Delphi,  72 
trierarchia,  90 
tribes,  84,  85 
triglyph,  24 
trilogy,  188,  256 
Triptolemus,  261 
trochilus,  26 

Trojan  Women,  of  Euripides,  194 
Troy,  280-1 

Tyrtaeus,  on  athletics,  66;  martial 
verses,  127 
Turks,  4,  32,  35 
tyrants,  of  Sicily,  16 

uncials,  116 

unities,  dramatic,  Aristotle  on,  247 
Uranus,  254 


INDEX 


329 


vases,  41-5;  vase  makers,  98;  vase- 
paintings,  42 
Vatican  Museum,  47 
vegetarianism,  258 
venality,  87 
Venetians,  36 

Venus,  of  Milo,  59  f . ;  of  Capua, 
60;  Capitoline,  61;  dei  Medici, 
61 ;  Genetrix,  61 

Vergil,  on  Laocoon,  61 ;  Georgies , 
125;  Bucolics,  291 
Victory,  statues  of,  32 ;  of  Paeonius, 
50;  of  Samothrace,  51,  58 
virtue,  Socratic,  229;  Aristotelian, 
245 

Vitruvius,  26;  on  Greek  theater, 
175-6 
volute,  26 
voting,  84 

wages,  95,  97 

Wagner,  R.,  and  Greek  Tragedy, 
207 

Walden,  J.  W.  H.,  169 
Wasps,  of  Aristophanes,  214 
wax-tablets,  114 
White,  J.  W.,  118 

windows  in  temples,  27;  in  houses, 
38,  39 


Wingless  Victory,  Temple  of,  32 
Wolf,  F.  A.,  284 

women  of  Athens,  107-111;  in 
Homer,  no;  in  the  drama,  110- 
1 ;  apartments  of,  39 
Woodbridge,  F.  J.  E.,  on  Greek 
Philosophy,  217 

Woolworth  Building,  N.  Y.,  36 
wooden  statues,  48 
woods,  for  building,  23 
Wordsworth,  on  Simonides,  135 
work  and  workers,  see  Chap.  VIII, 
esp.  90  ff. 

Works  and  Days  of  Hesiod,  124 

wrestling,  76 

writing,  see  Chap.  IX 

Xanthippe,  228 

Xenophanes,  on  athletics,  65; 
as  poet,  128;  as  philosopher, 
221-222 

Xenophon,  101,  109,  138 
Xdrxes,  20,  27 

Zeno,  the  Eleatic,  222;  the  Stoic, 
249 

Zenodotus,  146 
Zeus,  254 

Zimmern,  A.  E.,  79 


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